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In Editha’s Days. 


The One-winged Angel, 


Page 9. 





o 



IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


A TALE OF RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 


MARY E.' BAMFORD 





PHILADELPHIA 

AMERICAN BAPTIST PUBLICATION SOCIETY 
1420 Chestnut Street 
1894 - 


Copyright 1894 by the 

American Baptist Publication Socibtt 


TO THOSE 


WHO HAVE ENTERED INTO 
THE HERITAGE OF 


RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 


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LIST OF AUTHORITIES 


The author gives the following as authorities for 
the facts embodied in this story ; 

Allen : “Young Folk’s History of the Reformation.” 
Armitage : “ History of the Baptists.” 

Brand : * ‘ Antiquities. ’ ’ 

Brown : “Memorials of Baptist Martyrs.” 

Crosby : “ History of the English Baptists.” 

Creighton : “Age of Elizabeth.” 

Collier: “ English Literature. ” 

Chambers ; “ Book of Days.” 

D’Aubigne : “ History of the Reformation.” 

De Amicis ; “ Holland and its People.” 

“Encyclopaedia Britannica.” 

Froude : “History of England.” 

Fox ; “Book of Martyrs.” 

Fisher : “ History of the Christian Church.” 

Geikie : “ The English Reformation.” 

Green : “ History of the English People.” 

Haywood : “ History of all Religions.” 

Hallam ; “State of Europe During the Middle Ages.” 
Johnson’s “Cyclopaedia.” 

Jones: “ The Baptists.” 

Keightly : “ History of England.” 

Knight: “ History of England.” 

Lippincott’s “Gazeteerof the World.” 

Little : “ Historical Lights.” 


5 


6 


LIST OF AUTHORITIES 


Llorente : “ History of the Inquisition.” 

Motley : “ Rise of the Dutch Republic.” 

Mosheim : “ Ecclesiastical History.” 

Neal : “ History of the Puritans.” 

Percy : “Tales of Kings and Queens of England.” 
Prescott : “ History of Philip H.” 

Robinson: “ History of Baptism.” 

SwiNTON : “ Condensed United States History.” 
Schiller : “ History of the Revolt of the Netherlands.” 
Yonge : “History of the Netherlands.” 




CONTENTS 


PAGB 

CHAPTER I. 

The Anabaptist and his Book, 9 

CHAPTER II. 

Stephen’s Riddle, 18 

CHAPTER III. 

The Books Destroyed, 27 

CHAPTER IV. 

Neighbor Eld Returns, 35 

CHAPTER V. 

Neighbor Eld’s Reward, 46 

CHAPTER VI. 

Counting the Cost, 60 

CHAPTER VH. 

The Fagot Retreat, 78 

CHAPTER VIH. 

News, 87 

CHAPTER IX. 

Flight, 99 

CHAPTER X. 

Safety and Separation, no 


7 


8 


CONTENTS 


page 

CHAPTER XI. 

Escape, 143 - 

CHAPTER XII. 

Editha’s Experience, 166 

CHAPTER XHI. 

Captured, 188 

CHAPTER XIV. 

In Prison, 203 

CHAPTER XV. 

Escape to England, 222 

CHAPTER XVI. 

Dark Days, 243 

CHAPTER XVII. 

Stephen and Thyra Disappear, 261 

CHAPTER XVHI. 

Continued Danger, 271 

CHAPTER XIX. 

The Siege of Leyden, . . . .- 293 

CHAPTER XX. 

Leyden is Saved, 305 

CHAPTER XXL 

After the Siege, 324 

CHAPTER XXIL 

After Years, 337 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


CHAPTER I 

THE ANABAPTIST AND HIS BOOK. 

“'T'HE angel flew with one wing,” whis- 

i pered Stephen, reverently. a.d. 

“Yes,” I answered, softly. 

We two children stood hand in hand before the 
wooden image of the one-winged angel. Stephen 
had wished to come to look at him again, but we 
were always very quiet when we were there. We 
did not wish to disturb anybody in the religious 
house ; but it was so strange to see an angel that 
had flown' into England at one time, bringing a 
spear-head, the very same spear-head, the priests 
said, that pierced the Saviour’s side when he 
hung on the cross. All the priests said so. It 
would be very wicked in any one to doubt it, and 
Stephen and I were sure that it was true. 

“Why does the angel stay here all the time? ” 
I whispered now to my sober cousin. “ The 
angel might fly again.” 

Stephen looked at the angel’s wooden form, and 
thought very seriously for a while. 


9 


10 


IN editha’s days 


“Perhaps the angel cannot fly any more,” he 
suggested at last. “ Perhaps he has stood so long 
that he has forgotten how. And it must be very 
hard to fly with one wing. Cousin Kditha, I saw 
a bird once that had a broken wing, and it could 
not fly, though its other wing was not hurt at all. 
How did this angel fly with only one wing?” 

But I shook my head in reply. I could not 
explain. I only believed that it must be so. 

“ Perhaps,” continued Stephen, his forehead 
drawn into wrinkles with his puzzled thinking, 
“ if I should go outdoors some night I might see 
an angel fly. Not this angel, because I suppose 
he likes this place so well that he will never want 
to fly again, but another angel ; and if I do, and 
if he has only one wing, I will find out how he 
flies, and then I will remember to tell you, 
Editha.” 

There was a little noise, and I pulled Stephen’s 
hand. We went softly out, and hurried away. 
We were always afraid that some of the priests 
might not like us to look at the angel, and yet 
the priests let pilgrims see him. It was like 
going to visit a person, Stephen and I thought. I 
do not think that either my mother or Stephen’s 
knew how much we children loved the angel, or 
how often we went to see him. 

Neither my mother nor my aunt would have 
objected, for they often went themselves, and my 
mother would sometimes tell us proudly that at 
the monastery of Hales, in Gloucestershire, she 


THE ANABAPTIST AND HIS BOOK 


II 


had been shown a vial that a great many pilgrims 
flocked to see. The priests said that the vial con- 
tained some of the blood of the Redeemer, but 
only those persons who had paid for enough 
masses could see the blood. All other people 
would look at the vial in vain, and although my 
poor mother tried as hard as she could to see the 
blessed sight, she saw nothing, notwithstanding 
she paid more money, even all she had. My 
father had told her that she was foolish to pay 
money for the sight ; but it was always a great 
source of regret afterward to my mother that she 
could not see the blood, though she was proud to 
have seen the vial. My father, from the time I 
could remember, was always increasingly doubt- 
ful of the tales of the monks and the friars, but 
my mother and Stephen’s mother believed every- 
thing. 

“I might have seen it,” my mother always 
regretfully repeated when she told us children the 
story of her unsuccessful look at the holy vial of 
Hales. “I am sure I might have seen it, if I 
only had money enough to have paid for two or 
three more masses. I wish I had seen the blood.” 

But my mother seldom spoke thus when my 
father was near. She would not talk much before 
him about such things, knowing that he was 
doubtful of them. And, indeed, one day he 
shocked her by saying that he had heard that the 
“Blessed Bottle of Hales” was only a cheat, 
made by the priests in order to secure money. 


12 


IN editha’s days 


“ The bottle is thick on one side,” asserted my 
father, with indignation in his voice, “ so that no 
one may see into it, and at first the priests keep 
that side turned toward a pilgrim. But the bottle 
holds blood truly, I hear, only it is the blood of a 
duck, and after the priests have told a man to 
repent and buy masses, and after the man has paid 
all the money he can, sometimes the priests 
secretly turn the bottle around, and then of 
course the man sees the blood. And the poor 
man is glad, not knowing how meanly he is 
cheated. But it makes me angry that the priests 
should be so wicked as to say that it is the blood 
of the Redeemer in that bottle. The priests — 
yes, the priests — are liars ! ” 

My father arose in great anger as he ended, and 
my mother clasped her hands and preserved a 
shocked silence. She afterward prayed to the 
saints that my father might be forgiven for mak- 
ing such a statement. But she spoke no more in 
his presence of the ‘‘ Blessed Bottle of Hales,” 
though she told us children that the king himself, 
Henry VIII. , believed in that bottle. 

“It must be a true relic,” added my mother 
reverently. 

I think that my father was very unhappy in 
those days, for he could not believe the priests, 
and he hardly knew where else to go for help. 
Oh, England was so dark then ! So many people 
were stumbling in that darkness. But my mother 
diligently taught me, so that I believed with great 


THE ANABAPTIST AND HIS BOOK 1 3 

faith in the one-winged angel of the spear-head, 
and in many other false things. 

My father, for some months past, had been in 
the habit of going to see an old man named John 
Bid, who lived in a little hut in our town. The 
walls were of mud and such pieces of timber as 
could be laid hold of. and the ridged roof was 
thatched over with straw ; but then the houses 
that Stephen and I lived in were not very large 
or good either. 

The old man, John Eld, had a book that my 
father, who often took me with him, charged me 
never to speak about to any one, not even to 
Stephen or to my mother. It was a book called 
the “ New Testament,” and my father said that a 
scholar named William Tyndale had written it 
out from Greek into English for the English peo- 
ple, and the priests were very angry ; and if they 
should ever find out that Neighbor Eid had a 
copy of the book, they would come and make 
him give it up, and perhaps treat him cruelly, and 
so I must never, never tell about it. 

My father went to Neighbor Eld’s to hear him 
read the New Testament, and I too listened 
eagerly, although I feared it was something 
mother would not like to have me do. But which 
was right, my father or my mother? I was 
greatly puzzled. 

Often when my father and I were there. Neigh- 
bor Eld would read to us out of his New Testa- 
ment a story about a man who went down from 


IN editha’s days 


H 

one town to another and fell among thieves, who 
robbed him and left him half dead, and when a 
priest came that way he would not help the poor 
man. And Neighbor Bid would also say that the 
priest of this story was like the priests now, for 
they had no pity on poor English souls that sin 
had left bleeding, and the priests would not come 
to their help. The priests would even hinder the 
good Samaritan, William Tyndale, who sought to 
bring the comfort of the gospel to England. And 
then my father and old Neighbor Eld would talk 
of things of which I knew nothing. Once I 
heard my father say : “I wish I could read as. 
well as you can.” And after that Neighbor Eld 
used to help father about some of the longer 
words that bothered him in the book. But 
indeed my father already could read quite well. 

But I did not tell my Cousin Stephen anything 
I heard at Neighbor Eld’s. I could keep a secret, 
if I was only a girl. I knew the very chink in 
the mud wall where Neighbor Eld hid his New 
Testament. He covered the hole with a piece of 
dry mud like the wall, and no one would have 
known that anything was hidden there. But do 
you think that I would have told where that hole 
was? 

When Stephen and I hurried away from the 
wooden angel that afternoon, we ran down the 
street till we came near its end. A priest was 
walking there, one we had never seen before. 
Stephen and I would have run away again, but 


THE ANABAPTIST AND HIS BOOK 1 5 

the priest stopped ns and asked ns if we knew in 
which hnt a man named John Bid lived. We 
pointed in the direction, and watched him as he 
walked toward the hnt, not far away. 

“ Neighbor Bid will not be home,” said Stephen 
softly to me. “ He weaves all day.” 

Bnt the priest pnshed open the door of Neigh- 
bor Bid’s low hnt, and went inside. 

“ He will not find him,” declared Stephen 
again. 

Bnt I was startled by a sudden thonght. 

“ Oh ! ” I cried ; “ oh, if he finds ” 

I had almost said “the New Testament! ” I 
stopped, frightened enongh to think I had nearly 
revealed the secret, even to Stephen. 

I snatched my hand away from my consin, and 
ran toward Neighbor Bid’s hnt. There was a 
small hole in one rickety side, a hole throngh 
which a person could look from ontdoors. I was 
determined to see what that priest was doing. 

“ Bditha, Bditha,” called Stephen from the 
distance, bnt I did not answer. 

I went softly around the little hnt and my bare 
feet made no noise as I stole toward the hole. 
Cantionsly I dropped on my knees, and pnt my 
eyes to the crevice in the wall. 

I could see somewhat inside, for the priest had 
left the door a little open to give light. He was 
evidently trying to find something. He walked 
around the room, stopping to stir with his stick 
the straw of Neighbor Bid’s bed. He looked very 


i6 


IN EDITHA’S days 


fierce, and I trembled as lie came nearer my 
place of observation. 

“ He will see me,” I thought in trepidation, 
and I drew back quickly. 

I heard the stick rattle in the corner next me, 
and I caught my breath But the footsteps inside 
the hut passed on, and I put my face again to the 
hole. 

Near the corner toward which the priest was 
going was the place in the wall where Neighbor 
Eld always hid his New Testament. Oh, was 
that priest going to find it ? I held my breath in 
fear, as he struck with his stick here and there, 
muttering impatiently to himself. 

The priest drew nearer — nearer to the spot ! 
There ! He was just in front of the hiding-place ! 

I strained my eyes to see. The priest hastily 
brushed by the spot, and his mutterings grew 
louder. I wondered if he was really sure that 
Neighbor Eld had a New Testament. But the 
priest did not find it. 

“ Editha, Editha,” called Stephen’s voice again. 
The boy was coming toward the hut, and I did 
not dare to stay. I sprang softly to my feet and 
ran swiftly away from the place. Neither 
Stephen nor I paused until we came safely to our 
own homes. 

“ I will tell Neighbor Eld that a priest went 
into his house,” I resolved, indignant that any- 
body should trespass upon the old man’s belong- 
ings during his absence. 


THE ANABAPTIST AND HIS BOOK 1 7 

But day after day went by, and still Neighbor 
Kid’s door remained shut. He seemed to have 
disappeared from the day of the stranger-priest’s 
visit. When I told my father of the strange thing 
I had seen, he looked very grave. 

“ Did the priests do anything to Neighbor Eld, 
father?” I asked, struck with fear. “He did 
read us good things.” 

My father did not answer, but that day he 
went to Neighbor Eld’s hut, and examined the 
crevice in the wall where the New Testament had 
usually been hidden. It was gone ! Neighbor 
Eld and his book had disappeared together. I 
heard my father murmur to himself something 
that I did not then understand : “ It is hard, it is 
hard for the old Anabaptist.” 

What was an “ Anabaptist ” ? and what did my 
father mean? I had never before heard that 
word with which I was to become so familiar be- 
fore many years had gone by. I did not know 
what Anabaptists had already suffered in England. 
Nor did I know that it was one charge against the 
hated and persecuted Lollards that they would 
not baptize their infant children. 

Neither was I aware that he who, nearly one 
hundred and fifty years before, had translated into 
English the whole Bible, — which now alas had 
become almost unreadable, because of the changes 
wrought in our language, — had suffered the ex- 
ecrations of priest and prelate because of his be- 
lief. Some have said that he was an Anabaptist. 

B 


CHAPTER II 


STEPHEN’S RIDDLE 

“ T KNOW something,” announced Stephen, 

A proudly. 

“What is it?” I asked. 

We two children were watching a hen that my 
mother had sent us to feed. 

“ A boy told it to me,” returned Stephen, look- 
ing much puffed up by his wisdom. 

“ What is it ? ” I asked again. 

“It is a riddle,” declared Stephen, losing none 
of his important air. “It is — ‘What folks are 
they who live in a cellar all the time, and never 
eat anything but salt fish till they die ? ’ ” 

“It isn’t anybody,” I answered emphatically. 

“ Yes, it is,” contradicted Stephen. 

“Who is it?” I unbelievingly questioned. 

But Stephen did not know. The boy who had 
been his informant had told him the riddle, but 
not the answer to it. 

“It is not anybody,” I reiterated, with great 
decision. “ Nobody could live in a cellar all the 
time, and eat nothing but salt fish ! You could 
not yourself, Stephen.” 

Stephen still remained unconvinced. 

That night, when my father came home 

i8 


STEPHEN’S RIDDEE 


19 


from work, and was taking his supper, Stephen’s 
shrill voice suddenly arose, questioning him : 
“What folks are they who live in a cellar all the 
time, and never eat anything but salt fish till they 
die?” 

I turned indignantly, with my lips ready parted 
to reprimand Stephen. I had supposed I had ban- 
ished such nonsense from his mind. He had not 
said anything about the riddle since he and I 
talked it over. I was wiser I thought than he, and 
no matter if I was only a girl, I felt that he might 
have believed me when I told him so positively 
that nobody could live in a cellar all the time, 
and eat nothing but salt fish. 

To my great surprise, however, my father sud- 
denly left his porridge, and with a groan that was 
half a sob, hurried out of the house. 

I had caught one glimpse of his face, and he 
seemed as if about to break forth in tears. 

Stephen and I stared blankly at one another. 

“Be still!” I fiercely warned my injudicious 
cousin. 

“ Why didn’t he answer me ? What made him 
go away and cry?” questioned the astonished 
Stephen, not regarding my admonition. 

But I was highly indignant at him for having 
said anything that made my father feel badly. 
He did not come back into the house. At last, 
quite worried about him, I slipped outside into 
the dark. Father was nowhere near that I could 
see. I ventured to walk around the house. On 


20 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


the far side I saw a dark object, and drawing 
softly near, I discovered that it was my father. 
He was down on his knees, his face hidden in his 
hands, sobbing. I caught some of his scarcely 
audible words : 

“Ivord, Lord,” he prayed, in broken tones; 
“give me strength. O Lord, my wife, my little 
girl ! If I follow thee, must they come to death 
too? O Lord, thou seest what the priests do. 
Oh, help me, help me ! ” 

His form shook, and he looked entreatingly up 
at the sky with his hands clasped. 

“ Father,” I called softly; “father.” 

He turned, and I ran to him. I felt his tears 
on my face as I kissed him, but I did not dare to 
ask any questions. I did not then know that his 
was a soul in the throes of the agony that pre- 
ceded decision. Should he blind his eyes to the 
truth, and live subject to the priests ? Or should 
he count not his life dear to himself ; and foresee- 
ing from the hatred with which the priests re- 
garded the New Testament what would be the 
probable fate of those who firmly held to that 
book, yet dare to bravely say, “ Lord, I will follow 
thee ” ? 

My father and I stood a few minutes in the 
night, and then we went into the house together. 
I realized that there was something that I did not 
understand. Why should Stephen’s riddle send 
father outdoors in this way ? 

I pondered for many days on this subject, but I 


STEPHEN’S riddle 


21 


could not arrive at any conclusion, and I felt it to 
be an insoluble mystery about which I dared not 
speak to any one. 

And yet had I known it, as I did afterward, 
there was a cellar in Oxford where something 
dreadful was happening that very year. Awhile 
before this, Cardinal Wolsey had transferred a 
number of students from Cambridge to Oxford, 
and unknown to him, perhaps, there were four of 
these new-comers who were zealous Gospellers. 
And in secret one of them named Clark was in 
the habit of reading St. Paul’s epistles aloud to 
the other young men when they came to his 
room. More and more young men came, in spite 
of Clark’s telling them that it was dangerous to 
do so. One of the young men, named Anthony 
Delabere, said : “I fell down on my knees, and 
with tears and sighs besought him that for the 
tender mercy of God he should not refuse me, 
saying that I trusted verily that he who had 
begun this in me would not forsake me, but would 
give me grace to continue therein to the end. 
When he heard me say so, he came to me, took 
me in his arms, and kissed me saying, ‘ The Lord 
God Almighty grant you so to do, and from 
henceforth ever take me for your father, and I 
will take you for my son in Christ’ ” 

For about six months the young men had been 
in the habit of meeting, when a London curate, 
named Thomas Garret, came back to Oxford to 
circulate Testaments. But he had been tracked, 


22 


IN editha’s days 


and orders were given to have him arrested. All 
that was going on about the New Testament 
among the young men was discovered. In Clark’s 
room books were found hidden behind the wain- 
scoting, and thus the proof was positive. 

Clark and a number of students were put into 
a cellar in which the butler of Cardinal’s College 
kept his salt fish. The odor of this cellar was 
dreadful, and the dampness and foul air began to 
affect the health of the poor prisoners. One day, 
after the captives had been taken out of the cellar 
and tried before the judges, a great fire was 
kindled at the head of the market place, and the 
prisoners were brought forth, each bearing a fagot. 
When they came to the fire, they were forced to 
throw into it the books that had been found in 
their rooms. After this, the young men were 
taken back and put into the fish cellar once more. 
Two only had been released on trial. 

The poor prisoners suffered terribly. They 
were fed on nothing but salt fish, and this of 
course created a burning thirst. Who could live 
in such air, amid such odors, fed on such food? 
As the weeks went by, the young men, wasted to 
shadows of their former selves,^ wandered up and 
down the dreadful cellar. Four of them, Clark, 
Sumner, Bay ley, and Goodman, were weakened 
by fever, and crawled along, leaning against the 
cellar walls. 

Clark, the oldest of the prisoners, became so 
weak that he could not walk, unless upheld by 


STEPHEN’S RIDDEE 


23 


some one else. By-aiid-by Clark became unable 
to walk at all, but lay stretched upon the damp 
floor. Feeling that he was about to die, he asked 
that he might be allowed to take the communion. 
The jailers carried the request to their master, 
who refused to allow the dying man such a privi- 
lege. 

When Clark heard this cruel refusal, he lifted 
up his eyes and murmured, “ Crede et mandu- 
casti^^'^ “ Believe, and thou hast eaten.” 

Three others of the prisoners were dying also. 
For six months, from February to August, the 
prisoners had been kept in that dreadful cellar. 
No wonder that four were dying ! The cardinal 
was besought to have pity. At last, about the 
middle of August, as the other young men in that 
cellar were praying over their four dying compan- 
ions, the commissioner arrived and informed 
them : “ His lordship, of his great goodness, per- 
mits the sick persons to be removed to their own 
chambers.” 

So litters were brought, and the dying men 
were earned out to their rooms. But Wolsey’s 
clemency did not extend to others besides the four. 
The rest of the prisoners yet remained shut in the 
fish cellar. 

Release came too late, however, for the four 
who had been carried out. Several of the mem- 
bers of the university tried to save the lives of the 
dying young men, but their efforts were unsuc- 
cessful. 


24 


IN kditha’s days 


Their deaths caused Cardinal Wolsey to relent 
a little however toward the other young men in 
the fish cellar. Perhaps Wolsey was afraid that 
people would be enraged against him for permit- 
ting the deaths of the four. Perhaps he did 
have some heart left in him, after all. At least 
he wrote to his agents at Oxford, concerning the 
other young men in the fish cellar : “ Set the 

rest at liberty, but upon condition that they do 
not go above ten miles from Oxford.” 

And so, wasted and weak, the young men who 
had endured so much for conscience’ sake, came 
out of the terrible cellar. Their weeping friends 
ran up to them and helped them to walk away 
from their place of imprisonment. 

My father told me afterward, when I was some- 
what older, that many a time during those 
months he could hardly bear to eat his own 
meals, so much did he feel pity for those poor 
young men, shut in that cellar suffering and 
dying ; and so certain did he feel that if he should 
persist in reading and following the word, he 
would bring not only himself but his wife and 
child into danger. 

“ How could I sit down to my own meal, and 
not think of those poor young men, starving in 
the Oxford cellar?” questioned my father, when 
he told me. “ But I could not speak to you about 
it, Bditha, that night when Stephen asked me his 
riddle. How could I let you know what cruel 
thing was being done ? It was not a tale to tell a 


STEPHEN’S RIDDEP: 


25 


child. It was enough that you should have seen 
that priest hunting for old Neighbor Eld and his 
Testament.” 

One of the young men who was in that fish 
cellar was John Frith, a great friend of William 
Tyndale. Awhile after this, John Frith was 
afraid of another arrest, and so he fled beyond the 
seas to Tyndale. 

My unlucky cousin Stephen soon forgot his rid- 
dle of the cellar, and no doubt my father thought 
that I too forgot it. But who can tell what 
a child forgets, and what she remembers ? I pon- 
dered the more for my quietness, and I never for- 
got the look I had seen on my father’s face the 
night Stephen asked his question. That look fas- 
tened the question in my mind. 

But I did not know that what my father com 
templated was more than a mere separation from 
the church of Rome. I did not know what Ana- 
baptist teaching he had had from Neighbor Eld. 
Nay, I did not know what teaching my father 
had had from our Eord. None teacheth like 
him. 

And I think that my father, even at this time, 
had begun to realize that he who for conscience’ 
sake became a Baptist, or an Anabaptist as the 
term was, thereby became a person hated above 
all others by the Popish priests. He whom the 
priests hated let him beware ! Rome had cellars 
worse than that fish cellar at Oxford ! Rome had 
the stake and the torture for just such men as the 


26 


IN EDITHA’S days 


Anabaptists, those heretics who persisted in refus- 
ing to allow their infant children to be baptized 
by the priests. This, this was the mark of a 
heretic indeed ! 

But Rome very well knew that no man was apt 
to revolt against her rule more quickly than he 
who had a Bible and read it. Away with the 
New Testament from England ! That book made 
Anabaptists. 

And the Anabaptists talked of freedom of con- 
science, religious liberty, man’s right to read the 
word of God, and worship God without compul- 
sion as to manner. Now “freedom,” “religious 
liberty,” had always been the one thing abhorred 
of Rome. She strove to make all men her obedient 
servants. She wanted no self-assertion, no indi- 
viduality, no thinking. Rome could think for 
all men. What they should do was obey. Why 
should any translator of the Bible, any reader of 
the Bible, disturb with his ideas of religious 
liberty, the order, the convenience of Rome’s 
system ? 

“Freedom of conscience,” “religious liberty.” 
No land on earth should have that if Rome could 
prevent ! 


CHAPTER III 


'FHK BOOKS DESTROYED 

S OMETHING had occurred that same year, a 
little while before this. Away from our town 
of Caversham, down the river Kennet, down the 
river Thames, lay London town. And there at 
old St. Paul’s, before the “ Rood of Northen,” as 
men called the crucifix by the great north door of 
the cathedral, a large fire was crackling and leap- 
ing one Sunday in February, 1 526. 

On a platform above the altar-steps, sat the 
great cardinal, Thomas Wolsey. Oh, he was a 
magnificent sight ! He wore a purple robe and 
scarlet gloves ; his shoes were golden, and a 
canopy of cloth of gold was over his head. Abbots 
and bishops and friars who were gorgeously dressed 
in satin and damask were around him ; and within 
the altar-rails, on the platform, were baskets that 
were piled with Lutheran books which had been 
seized by Wolsey ’s orders. 

The sermon was preached by John Fisher, the 
old bishop of Rochester, who could not be heard 
because of the disturbance of the great number of 
people — for the building was full, so full that no 
more could get in. After the sermon, five men 
were brought in to kneel down and ask forgiveness 

27 


28 


IN editha’s days 


of God and the church and the cardinal ; and then 
these men were led three times around the fire be- 
fore the Rood of Nor then, as a warning of what 
they might expect to suffer if they said or did any- 
thing more against the Romish friars. One of the 
five men was an Augustine friar himself, and he 
had been threatened with being burned to death 
if he did not retract a sermon he had preached. 
But as at last he had agreed to come publicly and 
kneel down and ask forgiveness, he was not to be 
burned. The books that had been taken by Wol- 
sey’s men were burned instead, and the cardinal, 
with the thirty-six abbots, priors, and bishops in 
splendid array, saw the books burned, and then 
all these mitred men departed. 

They had conquered ! 

But had they ? Oh, Cardinal Wolsey, you did 
not know everything ! You need not have thought 
that by burning some books everything would 
be made quiet in England ! If you did think that 
at all, you were mightily mistaken. For there 
was coming to poor, down-trodden, priest-ruled 
England, a book greater than any that Euther or 
his followers ever wrote. The New Testament 
was coming, coming in the English tongue. Oh, 
how Cardinal Wolsey hated that such a thing 
should come to pass. 

It was only a few months after this burning that 
the first of Tyndale’s English New Testaments 
entered England. There were three thousand 
printed New Testaments secretly brought into 


THE BOOKS DESTROYED 


^9 


Knglaiid, and the bishops had had letters of warn- 
ing from the continent about them ; but the bish- 
ops could not find out who it was that was spread- 
ing the books. 

The bishops did their best though to keep the 
New Testaments away. Through the English 
ambassador, attempts were made to punish the 
printer of the Testaments, but nothing could be 
done beyond seizing three hundred copies of the 
book. The rest of the New Testaments found 
their way to Eondon in spite of the bishops. No 
wonder that those English folk who had the New 
Testaments must be so very careful not to let a 
single priest know it. 

“ Father,” I whispered one evening after Neigh- 
bor Eld’s disappearance, “ do you think that any- 
body found out that Neighbor Eld had a New 
Testament? ” 

I had put my mouth close to my father’s ear, 
for I was afraid to ask such a question aloud. It 
was yet a secret from my mother that I had ever 
seen such a book. 

My father shook his head as if he could not 
answer my question. 

“I miss his reading,” he returned, sadly; “I 
miss it greatly. I wish I knew how you and I 
could get a New Testament, Editha.” 

“ So do I, father,” I rejoined. 

It was partly childish sympathy that made me 
speak so. Still I often thought of things that I 
had heard in Neighbor Eld’s hut, and I often 


30 


IN kditha’s days 


remembered the story the old man had read about 
the traveler from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell 
among thieves. 

I especially remembered that story, because I 
had heard Neighbor Eld comment on it, and be- 
cause in my childish mind I contrasted the 
gospel story with one that my mother had fre- 
quently told Stephen and me, about a robber and 
the Virgin. The robber got his living by going 
out on the highways and plundering travelers. 

“ It was wicked in him to be a thief, of course,” 
explained my mother when she told us the story ; 
“but whenever he went out robbing, he was 
always careful to pray to the Virgin first. At last 
this robber was taken, and was about to be hanged, 
but while the rope was around his neck, he prayed 
as usual, and his prayer was answered, for the 
Virgin herself held him up with her white hands 
so that he did not die, but lived for two days 
hanging there ; and the man who hanged the 
robber was astonished and tried to kill him with 
a sword. But every stroke of the sword was turned 
away by an unseen hand, and at last the execu- 
tioner had to let the robber go free, for there was 
no killing him, because the Virgin heard his 
prayer. And after he was free, the robber went 
to an abbey and became a monk.” 

“Was it one of the monks that live here?” 
asked Stephen, who had listened very attentively 
to the story. 

“No, no,’ ’ answered my mother, hastily. ‘ ‘ No, 


THE BOOKS DESTROYED 3 1 

it was no one here. Never think it, Stephen. 
None of them were ever robbers.” 

And so this foolish, monkish tale stayed in my 
mind, and I never saw a new priest without re- 
calling it. I thought too, of the gospel tale, and 
of how I had heard Neighbor Bid say that the 
priests would hinder that good Samaritan, William 
Tyndale, from bringing the comfort of the gospel 
to poor English souls that sin had left bleeding 
by the highway. 

But my mother would have been frightened 
had she known that I had ever seen or listened to 
the words of the New Testament, for I had heard 
her say that it was only a few years before, during 
the reign of the same king, Henry VIII., that 
readers of the Bible were compelled to wear the 
fagot-badge on their clothes. 

I did not then know that William Tyndale, he 
who would translate the New Testament into 
English, had been obliged several years prior to 
go to Germany in order to make the translation ; 
and that he said of himself : ‘‘I understood at the 
last, not only that there was not room in my lord 
of London’s palace to translate, the New Testa- 
ment, but also that there was no place to do it in 
all England. ’ ’ 

And now that the New Testament had been 
translated and printed, what would the bishops 
do if they could find the books ? Ah, those flames 
by the Rood of Northen shone yet in the eyes of 
thinking men. 


32 


IN editha’s days 


It was those flames that burned the words of the 
New Testament into my father’s heart. Yet, 
though he believed the truth himself, he could 
not help my absorbing many foolish notions con- 
cerning the saints. I remember that one evening 
when I was whispering to my father about the 
New Testament, I suddenly heard Stephen crying 
in the next room. 

I slipped from my father’s knee, and ran to see 
what was the matter with my beloved cousin. 

“My tooth aches,” sobbed Stephen, when I 
asked him. 

“ Oh ! ” I exclaimed, sympathetically ; “I am 
so sorry.” 

I looked at him, and an idea occured to me. 

“ Stephen,” said I, “ when you and I grow big 
enough, we will go on a pilgrimage to some mon- 
astery that has one of the teeth of St. Apolonia. 
People say that her teeth cure the toothache. 
And maybe, Stephen, you and I might be rich 
enough to get one of St. Apolonia’s teeth our- 
selves, and keep it always, and then we never 
could have toothache any more, could we? We 
will keep the tooth where we both know where 
it is, so that you can find it in a minute if I am 
not home when your tooth begins to ache.” 

I grew quite enthusiastic over this plan, but to 
Stephen, suffering from the present toothache, my 
proposition of future help seemed to bring but 
little relief. 

“Why doesn’t St. Apolonia help me now, if 


THE BOOKS DESTROYED 


33 


she’s ever going to? ’’sobbed Stephen, clasping 
his aching face ; “ I think she might. I think she 
isn’t a real good saint if she doesn’t help me now, 
when she knows I am going to a monasteiy to see 
her tooth as soon as I am big enough. Oh ! Oh ! ” 
And Stephen wept and would not be consoled, 
while I was quite shocked that Stephen did not 
speak more respectfully of St. Apolonia. For I 
believed in the magical power of that saint’s teeth 
with all my heart. 

Alas ! It was not till years after, during the 
suppression of the monasteries, that I learned that 
the teeth of St. Apolonia, which had been held as 
sacred relics, had been brought together from the 
different convents, and it was found that there 
were so many of these teeth that they filled a tun ; 
so wickedly had the monks deceived the poor 
English people by pretending that those were 
saints’ teeth which were not. 

“A goodly mouth had St. Apolonia,” I heard 
a man laughingly say once in those after years, 
when he heard of the great quantity of teeth that 
had been collected. “ Had ever a saint such a 
mouth as she to hold so many teeth ? ” 

Ah, what a world was England, where men 
might believe as many such foolish superstitions 
as possible, and the priests would rejoice and foster 
such ideas ; but let a man once go to the holy 
Scripture and read for himself, and strive to follow 
the solemn commands laid down there, and see 
with what fury the priests would rage. And if 
c 


34 


IN editha’s days 


the simple reading of the word was such a sin in 
the eyes of Rome, what penalty would be sufficient 
punish the crime of those who not only dared 
to read the New Testament, but in spite of lash 
or fagot, would have courage to say that the 
priestly baptism received in infancy was nothing, 
and would be immersed on profession of their faith 
in Christ? Should an English person think for 
himself? Should he have an English New Tes- 
tament? Should he dare be immersed? Not if 
Rome could prevent it. She had heard of these 
Anabaptists before. They had been thorns in her 
side. Rome had persecuted Anabaptists for cen- 
turies on centuries. Woe, woe to any in England 
who dared be “re-baptized.” 

Was it not enough that the sermons of John 
Huss had been full of “ Anabaptistical errors” ; 
that the followers of Huss would admit none to 
their fellowship until such person was “ dipped in 
water ” ; that many of Huss’ followers became 
Anabaptists? Had not Jerome of Prague been 
baptised by immersion, and were not Huss and 
Jerome both burned to death long ago ? Had not 
Rome done her best to blot the Anabaptists from 
the earth ? What was this doctrine that it should 
live and grow during all these centuries since the 
apostles’ days ? 


CHAPTER IV 


NEIGHBOR EED RETURNS 

N eighbor eed was back. isaa 

I could hardly believe it when I met him 
one morning on my journey from getting some 
water. He knew me, and smiled at me as he 
used to do. But he looked very thin and more 
bent, and when his smile was gone his face was 
more sad than I had ever seen it before. But how 
many months he had been away. 

“ Oh ! ” I exclaimed joyfully ; “ I am so glad 
you have come. I will tell father. Where have 
you been? ” 

Neighbor Eld smiled again, but faintly, at the 
childish heartiness of my greeting. 

“I have been in London,” he informed me. 
And the sound of his voice was sad. 

But I was too full of joy to notice sadness then, 
and I ran toward home, carrying the water so care- 
lessly that part of it spilled, so eager was I to tell 
my mother that Neighbor Eld had returned. 

My mother received the tidings calmly enough. 
” So the priest did not find him at all, I think,” 
I went on. 

“What priest? ” questioned my mother, to my 
dismay, for I suddenly remembered that of course 

35 


IN kditha’s days 


36 

I had never told her of the priest I had watched 
through the chink in the hut as he hunted for 
Neighbor Bid’s Testament. My mother would 
have thought it dreadful that I should have set 
myself to be a spy on a priest. Now how should 
I explain to her without saying anything to betray 
Neighbor Eld’s confidence? 

But before I could collect my scattered wits 
enough to speak, my mother seized my dress and 
shook it a little. 

“You have spilled water enough to wet your 
dress,” she chided me. “You must be more 
careful.” 

Evidently she thought little of my words about 
the priest, and I ran away, thankful to escape ob- 
servation, and determined to be more careful. I 
felt somewhat guilty at the thought of having any 
secret from my mother, however. 

“ But father knows. It is our secret about the 
New Testament,” I argued, inwardly. “ Father 
told me not to tell anybody. If mother knew 
about it, she might tell the priests. Father will 
be so glad to find out that Neighbor Eld has come. 
Now we shall hear the New Testament again.” 

So full was I of this thought that I paid but 
little heed to my cousin Stephen that evening, 
when he told me a friar had told him that day, 
that in one of the English monasteries there was 
to be seen the very ear which belonged to the ser- 
vant Malchus, that was cut from his head by the 
sword of St. Peter. 


NEIGHBOR BED RETURNS 37 

“ I am going to see that ear, when I am grown 
and can make pilgrimages,” boasted Stephen. 

But if I cared little for my cousin’s speech, it 
was not so with a fierce, bigoted old woman, a 
neighbor of ours, who overheard Stephen, and 
patted him on the shoulder, and told him he was 
a good lad to think so much of religion. 

“ Pilgrimages are good, and the priests tell us 
to make as many as we can,” quoth the stern old 
woman. “ I^addie, never turn against the priests. 
They know religion. Those folk who turn 
against our religion shall have trouble. When I 
was as young as you, laddie, my mother told me 
once that St. Peter himself appeared one time, 
and punished even a priest who was going to 
neglect his duty to King Eadbald. You know, 
laddie, that King Eadbald ruled here hundreds of 
years ago, and he was a heathen king and mar- 
ried a widow, and was for turning away from our 
good religion that some bishops had tried to teach 
him. And two bishops that had been in this 
land preaching went back to France, but there 
was one left, named Eaurentius. And he was 
about to go and leave the king to be a heathen. 
But the night before Eaurentius was to go he 
had his bed made in the church. And in the 
morning he came to say good-bye, and showed his 
bare back and shoulders, all bloody with a whip- 
ping. And King Eadbald asked, ‘ Who has dared 
treat you so ? ’ and Eaurentius said, ‘ The prince 
of the apostles, St. Peter, came to me in the dead 


IN EDITH A’S days 


38 

of night, and beat me because I had thought of 
leaving you and these people to be heathen per- 
sons.’ 

“And King Eadbald was so frightened at this 
sign from heaven that he put a stop to worshiping 
idols, and became a great Christian. And do you 
think if St. Peter punished a priest, he will not 
punish common folk who turn against the priests, 
and say they see no good in pilgrimages and holy 
relics, and wish, like that wicked man who, folks 
say has v/ritten the New Testament in English, 
to read the Scriptures themselves? You must 
never be wicked like that, laddie. It would be a 
great pity for a lad like you, living where you can 
go see our angel of the spear-head.” 

There were cold chills running up and down 
my back, and I was glad the fierce little old 
woman paid more attention to Stephen than to 
me. Her account of this one of the first Romish 
miracles of English history had frightened me, 
and I looked fearfully about as the shadows grew 
longer, dreading lest St. Peter should single me 
out also as a fit subject for punishment. He must 
know, I thought, that I had been with my father 
sometimes to Neighbor Eld’s hut, and had seen a 
New Testament in English, and had even heard 
it ‘read. 

“Suppose,” I whispered to myself, “oh, sup- 
pose St. Peter should come to me with a big whip 
in his hand ! ” 

I was so frightened at this thought that I ran 


NEIGHBOR EED RETURNS 39 

into tlie house, and kept close beside my mother 
for a while. 

But still, when my father came tired with his 
work, I made haste to tell him of old Neighbor 
Bid’s reappearance, and my father, I could see, 
was very anxious to meet his friend. 

‘‘ Bet me go with you, father? ” I pleaded softly 
in his ear, my fears about St. Peter’s wrath hav- 
ing vanished at his presence. “ Bet me go ? ” 

My father hesitated only a moment, ere he 
replied, “Yes, child.” 

It was almost dark when we went quietly out 
and hurried to Neighbor Bid’s. 

“ He will read to us out of the New Testament 
again,” I whispered to my father. 

“ Hush ! ” he answered softly, and my few 
words seemed to cause him such trepidation that 
I wished I had not spoken. Was it unsafe to refer 
to the New Testament in any way? 

My father rapped softly on Neighbor Bid’s 
door, but there was no answer. Finally father 
pushed the door open. The room inside was 
nearly dark, but at last we perceived a bowed 
form sitting near that place where the New Testa- 
ment had formerly been hidden in the wall. We 
stepped inside the hut, and sat down together 
beside our old neighbor, but he paid no attention 
to us. 

“You have been gone long, good neighbor,” 
began my father kindly. 

But a great sob, as of recognition of us as 


40 


IN editha’s days 


friends to whom some deep sorrow might be told, 
broke from old Neighbor Eld at these words, and 
my father, surprised and shocked, put his hand on 
the bowed form. 

Neighbor Eld, ” asked my father gently, ‘ ‘ what 
troubles you ? ” 

The old man could not speak, till at last, strug- 
gling with his sobs, he answered brokenly : “It 
is gone ! It is gone ! ” 

“The New Testament? ” whispered my father. 

Neighbor Eld made a sign of assent, and we 
sat in silence. This was indeed a heavy blow. 

After a time, bending toward us, one hand sup- 
porting him. Neighbor Eld spoke : 

“ I opened my Testament that I might but see 
the holy words once again before I gave the book 
up to the fire,” said the grieved old voice. “ Poor, 
well-thumbed book, could not the cardinal’s men 
have let me keep it ? I shall never have another ! 
/ shall never have another ! ” 

The old man sobbed the words over, as he 
rocked himself to and fro. My father sighed 
heavily. It seemed but too likely that Neighbor 
Eld would never have a New Testament again. 
So the priests had found him. 

“ Ah ! but the book has been such a comfort to 
me,” grieved the old man. “ But what do you 
think the words were that I saw when I opened 
my Testament for the last time, just as I must 
give it up ? ‘ He hath putt doune the myghty 

from their seates, and hath exalted them of lowe 


NEIGHBOR EED RETURNS 41 

degre.’ And a priest struck at the book In my 
hand, and the book fell into the fire, and I said in 
my heart : ‘ May God put down all such priests 

from their seats.’ And I remembered the words 
that come before those I read : ‘ And hys mercy 

is always on them that feare him thorow oute all 
generacions.’ ” 

Neighbor Eld’s sobs were gone, and he appeared 
eager and excited. 

“ ‘ He hath putt doune the myghty from their 
seates, and hath exalted them of lowe degre,” he 
repeated, as if he saw it already done. 

We sat longer in the dark than we meant, 
for the old man told us of the imprisonment 
he had suffered for several months, and of the pri- 
vations he had undergone. And then my father, 
saying that he had hungered for the words of the 
New Testament, begged the old man to tell any- 
thing that he remembered of the word. 

And so for a long time Neighbor Eld’s hushed 
voice went on repeating to us such passages of the 
Testament as he remembered, telling us other 
things partly in his own language and partly in 
the words of Scripture. My father listened 
eagerly as one whose soul thirsted for such 
tidings. 

At last Neighbor Eld broke off suddenly, and 
we hastened to go, knowing that the weary old 
man ought to be sleeping. 

“ Tell no one of the loss of the New Testament, 
Editha,” charged my father, on the way home. 


43 


IN kditha’s days 


I ventured to speak to my father of the fierce, 
little old woman’s story of lyaurentius’ bloody 
back and shoulders, clinging very fast to his hand 
as I told him, and I cast a timid look behind us, 
while I asked: “Oh, father, do you think St. 
Peter would come and whip you and me to-night, 
for going to Neighbor Bid’s to talk about the New 
Testament ? ” 

My father stooped, and took me in his arms. 

“No, Bditha, no,” he answered softly. “St. 
Peter will never harm you or me. Oh, my child, 
it is the Bord Jesus who has power over us. He 
loves us. His care is around you and me now. 
I wish your mother could understand how false 
all these monks’ tales and priests’ lies about the 
saints are. But I hope the Bord will lead her to 
see some day. Now it would grieve her to know 
that I pray no more to the saints or the Virgin. 
I pray only to the dear Bord who died for us, and 
I pray him to send a new heart and an open Eng- 
lish Bible to every person in England. But love 
your mother and obey her, Editha, for she is 
right in all but this.” 

I did not wholly understand my father’s speech ; 
but I knew, as he gently put me down again and 
held my hand, that he cared very, very much 
about the New Testament and about the Bord 
Jesus, and was not at all afraid of St. Peter. I 
was very glad, and I looked boldly at the dark 
now since I was sure that St. Peter was not hiding 
in the shadows plotting vengeance. 


NEIGHBOR BED RETURNS 


43 


“I will always tell father everything that 
frightens me,” I resolved. “He knows whether 
I need be afraid or not. And I will never, never 
tell anybody about the New Testament. I am 
glad I have seen one, anyway.” 

But when we arrived home, the influences about 
me changed somewhat. We found my mother 
sprinkling a little holy water about my bed, and 
I took this practice to be of course a part of re- 
ligion. For my mother had always been wont to 
sprinkle holy water about my bed and about her 
own ; and my aunt at her house, sprinkled holy 
water about her bed and about Stephen’s, and my 
mother and my aunt each used to carry a bit of 
holy bread about with her, and made offerings of 
candles, and believed much in rosaries, and in 
many like things. And, moreover, my mother 
knew, and often repeated certain prayers that 
were to be said before the image of Our Lady of 
Pity, which prayers would make sure, she believed, 
that the person who said them should see Our 
Lady’s face, and “ be warned both of the day and 
hour of his death.” 

But my mother felt somewhat unhappy and 
worried about my father, because last Good Friday 
he had not crept to the cross, the omission of which 
act was a heinous sin in her eyes. She of course 
had crept to the cross on Good Friday, and had 
made me do it too. .My father had done it in past 
years, but his actions now were incomprehensible 
to my mother. 


44 


IN editha’s days 


For as yet she knew nothing of my father’s 
turning toward the Anabaptists, since he had not 
dared speak to her about that, but had begun 
to talk to me about it, his mind being so full of 
the subject that he could hardly refrain from 
speaking to some one. I tried to understand, 
thinking that my father shared wise thoughts with 
me, yet I hardly knew why he became so excited 
and earnest when he spoke of the matter. He told 
me, I remember, that the Anabaptists ought right- 
fully to be called Baptists, for they believed in but 
one baptism, but their enemies insisted on calling 
them ‘‘ Anabaptists,” and it could not be helped 
since there was no religious liberty in the land, 
and the priests were determined to bind every 
man’s soul to the church of Rome. 

“ But the priests know well enough that the 
Anabaptists are older than the Catholics,” my 
father went on eagerly. “ Our belief about bap- 
tism goes back to the days of Christ’s apostles, 
and is no new thing, as the priests would have 
people believe. ’ ’ 

He sighed heavily, and I looked at him wonder- 
ing and believing what was told me, and yet not 
realizing its grave import. 

“ I pray God that religious liberty may come to 
England sometime,” broke forth my father, 
vehemently. “ Remember, Editha, the Ana- 
baptists are no new people, no matter what the 
priests may say.” 

‘‘Religious liberty!” Whence had the Ana- 


NEIGHBOR EED RETURNS 


45 


baptists that idea? Was it not from the New 
Testament? Surely they never derived that idea 
from two of the great leaders of the Reformation, 
for neither I<uther nor Zwingli was willing to 
grant liberty of thought and action to the Ana- 
baptists, though lyuther and Zwingli themselves 
demanded such liberty when disputing with the 
Romanists. Why should one man demand relig- 
ious liberty for himself, and deny it to another 
man ? Are we not all equal before God ? So I 
think that Luther, great and good man that he 
was, did wrong in refusing liberty of conscience 
to the Anabaptists ; and I am sure that the Ana- 
baptists derive their great idea of religious liberty 
for all men from the New Testament. 


CHAPTER V 


NEIGHBOR bed’s REWARD 
HREE weeks’ later I was doing an errand near 



A nightfall. I hastened to be home, when 
suddenly a man stood before me in the way. He 
was a stranger, and though the twilight was deep- 
ening, I saw a very noticeable dark mark on one 
of his cheeks. I was startled by his unlooked-for 
coming, and would have run from him, but he 
spoke kindly. 

‘‘Did I fright you, little lass?” asked he. 
“ Can you tell me where there lives a man called 
John Eld — ^an old man he is? ” 

I hastily gave directions for finding the house, 
and ran away, wondering at the dark mark on the 
man’s face. I had a passing recollection of the 
stranger priest whom I had once directed to 
Neighbor Eld’s house. But I was sure that this 
man was no priest. He looked more like a car- 
penter, or some hard-working man. 

“I wonder what was the matter with his 
cheek ? ” I thought. 

He would find Neighbor Eld at home I was 
sure, for the old man had grown so feeble that he 
seldom left his hut night or day. And whether 
the visitor were friend or foe, there would be no 


NEIGHBOR EED’S REWARD 47 

New Testament to be found in Neighbor Eld’s 
hut. But I heard no more of the man with the 
marked cheek until the next night. 

The evening of the next day my father came 
home, and smiled at me as he said, “ Editha, 
when we have eaten, you and I will go and carry 
some broth to Neighbor Eld. We have been 
together to see him only once since he came 
back.” 

I was ready enough to go. My mother made 
the broth, and she and my aunt and Stephen had 
hardly finished eating before my father and I set 
forth on our errand. 

Blit I was not prepared for the meeting between 
my father and Neighbor Eld. Into the little hut 
my father and I went, I holding the broth. But 
I almost dropped it in my amazement when I saw 
my father and Neighbor Eld, usually so undemon- 
strative, throw their arms around one another, and 
burst into tears ! 

There was a little silence, and then the old 
neighbor’s quivering voice murmured : “ Blessed 
be the Eord God of Israel, who has granted us his 
word again.” And my father added, “ Amen.” 

It was quite awhile before I could understand 
what had occurred. The stranger whom I had 
directed to Neighbor Eld’s hut the evening before 
had been a bearer of good. He was one of the 
men who were secretly scattering the New Testa- 
ment very widely throughout England. He had 
heard in some way of Neighbor Eld, and had 


IN editha’s days 


48 

ventured into our town, daring the possible dis- 
covery by priests, in order to comfort the old man 
with a Testament again. And so Neighbor Bid 
had one now. I was so glad. 

“There are a great many Testaments being 
brought secretly into England,” my father told 
me, “ and there are some London tradesmen and 
citizens who have formed themselves into a com- 
pany called the ‘ Christian Brethren,’ and they 
have sent out men to carry the Testaments here 
and there secretly throughout the country, that 
the poor may have the books.” 

But the bishop of London, Tunstall by name, 
had issued an edict against the New Testament, 
and men knew that the bishop would burn every 
one of the books if he could, so English people 
must beware. 

It was hard for my father and for Neighbor 
Eld to sufficiently quiet their excitement so that 
they could read in the blessed book that had come 
again. Neighbor Eld was weak, and it was diffi- 
cult for him to see, and my father could not read 
so well as the old man did, but between them 
some precious words of Scripture were made out 
and talked over. I listened with rapt attention, 
trying to understand, for I had become aroused to 
the idea that the New Testament must be a very 
wonderful book, since people had to hide it so, 
and make such a secret of owning a copy. 

When we arose to go. Neighbor Eld nervously 
asked my father if it would not be better for him 


NEIGHBOR bed’s REWARD 49 

to take the New Testament with him for safe 
keeping. 

“ I am known to the friars as one whom they 
suspect,” explained Neighbor Eld. “ They know 
that I once had a Testament, and if they should 
find that one of the ‘ Christian Brethren ’ had 
been in this town, I might have a visit from the 
friars, and this Testament might be taken. But 
the priests do not suspect you, do they ? ” 

My father hesitated. 

“I know not,” he answered. “Who can tell 
what secret ways the friars have of gaining 
knowledge of things? ” 

“Will you not take the Testament with you ? ” 
proffered the old man again. “ It would be a sore 
loss to you as well as to me, if the priests should 
get the book, ’ ’ 

The old man’s voice trembled. He was offering 
to make a great sacrifice in letting my father take 
the book. But my father would not allow it. 

“No, no,” answered my father kindly. “ The 
book will comfort you through the long days, and 
you can tell me what you have read. ” 

“ Come very often here then,” replied Neighbor 
Eld. “ Come and read the book. And, good 
friend, I have not many more days in this world. 
I know that. When I am dead the Testament is 
yours. You will find it in its place in the wall.” 

“ Oh, Neighbor Eld, I hope you will live many 
years, even till the time comes when every man 
in England may have his own Bible, and read it 

D 


50 IN editha’s days 

boldly,” rejoined my father cheerily, and we went 
away. 

“You must learn to read, Editha,” my fathei 
said, as we walked home. “ I will teach you the 
little I know, and I must learn all I can of Neigh- 
bor Eld. I must do it speedily, though I hope he 
may live long yet.” 

We walked on in silence a few minutes, and 
then my father spoke again. 

“After you can read well, Editha,” he con- 
tinued, “you will be able to know what to believe, 
and what not to believe. Poor child ! You have 
been told so many saints’ tales, and have heard 
only a little of the Testament. I hardly know 
what a mixture of truth and error may be in your 
mind, but the New Testament is all true every 
word, and you must believe it all. But it troubles 
me to have you told such tales as that which your 
aunt told you and Stephen the other night. ” 

I well remembered the story that my aunt had 
told us. It was one of the vain traditions of the 
friars concerning the rosary. 

“St. Dominic,” my aunt had said, in telling 
my cousin and myself the tale, “preached once 
in favor of the rosary, and a Spanish maiden hear- 
ing him, was convinced, and went and got herself 
a rosary, with which she told her beads quite 
regularly. Still she did not become better than 
she was before. But she used her rosary often 
enough. One day this maiden was seized, and 
her head was cut off and thrown into a well.” 


NEIGHBOR bed’s REWARD 5 1 

Oh ! oh ! ” Stephen and I exclaimed, greatly 
excited at such a catastrophe. 

“Yes,” affirmed my aunt, with great earnest- 
ness, “her head was cut off and thrown into a 
well ; and as she had sinned a great deal, she 
would have had a dreadful time if it had not been 
for that rosary. But because she had said her 
beads quite regularly, the Holy Virgin had pity 
on the maiden, and allowed her soul to come 
back into her head. Then St. Dominic received 
word about the girl, and he went to the well and 
said to the head, ‘ Come up.’ ” 

Stephen’s eyes and mine opened wide, and we 
listened breathlessly for the result of this com- 
mand. 

“Yes,” nodded my aunt, enjoying our excite- 
ment, “ St. Dominic said to the head, ‘ Come up,’ 
and up the well the head came.” 

I gave a little gasp at this, and listened, awe- 
struck. 

“The head sat down on the well-side,” con- 
tinued my aunt, “and begged St. Dominic to 
help her. The girl’s head said that she must pass 
two hundred years in purgatory unless St. Dominic 
and others would help her. And St. Dominic was 
so good and kind that he listened while the girl 
told him her sins, a thing she had not had time to 
do before her head had been cut off. And St. 
Dominic forgave her her sins, and she received 
the wafer. And for two days her head preached 
to the people who came to see her. And then she 


52 


IN editha’s days 


died, and at the end of fifteen days her soul 
appeared in glory to St. Dominic, and thanked 
him for having, by the rosary, delivered her from 
the place of penance. 

“ And so, children,” concluded my aunt, “you 
must always be sure to say your prayers over and 
over and over, the more times the better, for the 
rosary has great power, and you never can tell 
what trouble even your prayers may save you 
from.” 

I think if my father had heard all this tale, he 
would have commanded my aunt never to tell me 
any more saints’ stories. But he had heard only 
a few words of what she said to us, and so did not 
interfere. He knew, in a general way, that she 
spoke of one of the many, many legends con- 
nected with the rosary, and perhaps with the 
saints, legends that he wished I might not hear, 
but which he could hardly prevent my knowing, 
since my aunt and my mother both believed in 
such tales to a great extent. The only thing that 
had caused me to have any doubt of the wonderful 
story at the time my aunt was speaking, was her 
mention of purgatory. My father had distinctly 
and repeatedly told me never to believe in such a 
place, for he said it was not once mentioned in the 
New Testament. But of course I dared not say 
anything about the New Testament to my aunt. 

She was displeased enough with my father 
already because he had heard and learned some 
rhymes that John Skelton, King Henry’s rhymster. 


NEIGHBOR bed’s reward 


53 


had written about the priests and the bishops. 
The rhymes were very bold indeed, and told of the 
bad doings of the clergy, and my father had 
repeated some of the words before my aunt at 
home one evening, and had thereby gained her 
strong disapproval. 

“ He says,” my father told us on that evening, 
speaking of John Skelton, “because the priests 
are so very ignorant — 

“ A priest without a letter. 

Without his virtue be greater, 

Doubtless were much better 
Upon him for to take 
A mattocke or a rake.” 


Even I, child that I was, had cried out at the 
audacity of that last sentence. 

“Why, father,” I cried ; “ no priest would work 
the way you do, with a plough or a rake ! ’ ’ 

My father’s face was stern. 

“No,” he answered, “they are much too idle 
for that.” 

And then I think my mother must have 
softly reminded him that I was but a little lass to 
hear such things, for my father’s face changed 
afterward, and he bade me not to trouble my 
small head about John Skelton’s rhymes. 

It was only a few weeks after Neighbor Eld had 
obtained the copy of the New Testament which 
gave us such joy, that the old man became very 
much more feeble. His strength, which had 


54 


IN editha’s days 


seemed little enough since his return, now gave 
way so that he could hardly prepare his own sim- 
ple meals. My father charged me to sometimes 
look in during the days and see how the old man 
fared, and at last I always carried him his supper, 
and waited there till my father came. 

Neighbor Eld usually greeted me when I 
entered, but one evening I went in and found him 
lying on his straw asleep. I stepped lightly not to 
waken him. He lay still, breathing heavily, very 
heavily indeed it seemed to me. 

“ But perhaps he always does so when he is 
asleep,” I reflected, and kept very quiet, resolving 
not to disturb him. 

“I wish father would come,” I thought, as 
Neighbor Eld’s breathing grew more and more 
loud. “Perhaps if I should touch his hand he 
might waken a little and not breathe quite so 
hard. It frightens me. ” 

For the hoarse breathing made a great deal of 
noise now, it seemed to me, in the quiet hut. But 
I dared not go near enough to the straw bed to 
touch the old man and waken him. Someway I 
was afraid. I shrank back into the corner near 
the opening which I had peered through the day 
when I looked at the doings of the priest inside 
the little hut. I listened to Neighbor Eld’s 
breathing. By-and-by it grew less loud. It be- 
came less and less. I waited, and the quiet room 
held no sound that I could perceive from the 
place where I sat. 


NEIGHBOR bed’s REWARD 55 

It had been so for a long time when the door 
opened and my father came in. 

“ How is he, Editha? ” he asked, softly. 

‘‘ He is asleep,” I answered cautiously. “ He 
breathed very loudly for a while, but he is still 
now.” 

My father went over to the straw. He knelt 
down silently. Then he put his hand suddenly 
on the old man’s head. 

“Neighbor Eld!” exclaimed my father, in a 
startled way. 

There was no answering sound. 

“ Neighbor Eld,” repeated my father. 

But there was silence, a silence that would 
never be broken by the old man’s voice. My 
father lifted Neighbor Eld’s head, and sent me for 
water, and tried in every way to bring back some 
sign of life, but the closed eyes did not open, and 
the forehead was cold. Neighbor Eld looked as 
if he were asleep. 

“He will never waken, Editha,” my father 
pronounced sentence at last. “ Eet us call in the 
neighbors. ” 

“ Is he dead ? ” I asked, and my father answered, 
“ Yes.” 

A few of the neighbors came at our summons, 
and one of the women said I ought to have shaken 
the old man when he breathed so strangely, and 
perhaps I might have wakened him, and he might 
have recovered. But my father told me afterward 
that I was not to blame. I had not known what 


56 IN BDITHA’S days 

to do, and nothing could have saved the old man 
from dying. 

“ He was ready to die,” added my father ; “and 
if you and I have the I^ord Jesus forgive us our 
sins, Editha, and try to follow him, we shall see 
Neighbor Eld again some day. I thank God that 
he is out of the power of the priests.” 

But I was overwhelmed with grief at the loss 
of my old friend. We had gone to see him so 
often, and he had always been so kind to me, tell- 
ing me stories from the New Testament and help- 
ing me learn to read. 

It was only the evening before this that my 
father and I had been with Neighbor Eld, and 
the old man had said to me, “ Read a little out of 
the New Testament, Editha,” and I had been 
very proud to do so, to show that I was beginning 
to know how to read somewhat better. 

Neighbor Eld found the place in the New Tes- 
tament. “Read here,” he said, pointing. 

And I read the words : “ Oure Father which 
arte in heven, halowed be thy name. Let thy 
kingdom come. Thy wyll be fulfilled, as well in 
erth, as hit ys in heven. Geve us this daye oure 
dayly breade. And forgeve vs oure treaspases, 
even as we forgeve them which treaspas vs. Eeede 
vs not into temptacion, but delyvre vs from yvell. 
Amen.” 

But Neighbor Eld would never read in his New 
Testament again. He would never hear me read 
any more. I cried when I thought of it. 


NEIGHBOR bed’s REWARD 


57 


The New Testament was my father’s now, 
since Neighbor Bid had left it to him, and my 
father took the book secretly away when we left 
the hut that night. I wondered very much where 
father would keep the New Testament so that 
mother should not find it. 

But my mother had no thought of such a book 
being in the house. What she inquired very 
anxiously of me was whether Neighbor Bid had 
spoken anything to me about mass being said for 
his soul after death. 

“No,” I answered, and my mother looked 
frightened. 

“I wish he had,” she murmured. 

The priests were very strict about folks who 
died, and if such had left no wish that masses 
should be said for their souls after death, it was 
considered a proof that the dead person had been 
a heretic. In such cases the priests were very 
severe. 

But in our town of Caversham, old Neighbor 
Bid was allowed to be peaceably buried, though I 
have always thought it was because my mother 
and my aunt were kind-hearted enough to pay the 
priests something not to interpose any authority 
to prevent our old neighbor’s quiet burial. 

Yet, if the priests had known what my father 
knew, I cannot tell what amount of money it 
might have taken to assuage their wrath, or 
whether indeed money would have had power to 
do it. But my father kept his secret well, and it 


58 


IN EDITHA’S days 


was not till months after Neighbor Eld’s funeral 
that my mother knew that the old man had been 
one of those Christians called Anabaptists, and 
that he and my father had many a time talked of 
immersion as taught in the New Testament, and 
had spoken together of the persecutions that Ana- 
baptists have endured through the ages, yea, and 
were yet to endure, judging from all indications. 

And yet I think if my father could have looked 
forward to that day when King Henry VIII. 
would send to convocation the article saying that 
baptism is “ necessary to salvation” ; that infants 
were “to be baptized for the pardon of original 
sin ” *, and that the opinions of the Anabaptists 
are “detestable heresies”; if my father could 
have looked forward to that other day when six- 
teen men and fifteen women were banished from 
England for opposing infant baptism, and after- 
ward going to Delft in the Low Countries, were 
persecuted and put to death as Anabaptists, the 
men being beheaded and the women drowned ; 
if my father could have looked forward to old 
Bishop Latimer’s declaration that “Anabaptists 
were burned in different parts of the kingdom, 
and went to the stake with good integrity,” I 
still think that my father would not have gone 
back from that which he believed the New Testa- 
ment teaches, the immersion of those only who 
have faith in our Lord Jesus Christ as their 
Saviour from sin. 

And yet it is well that we cannot look forward. 


NEIGHBOR EED’S REWARD 


59 


For you can see that at this time my father had 
but recently emerged from the darkness of the 
Popish faith, and perhaps he might have been 
affrighted if he could have foreseen the dreadful 
days in store for Anabaptists, not only in England, 
but in the country whither we went. But God 
leads us on as we are able to bear it, and his 
strength is promised to us in accordance with our 
days. It has been only by his grace that any 
Anabaptist has stood firm, for truly all the powers 
of intolerance seem to have opposed themselves 
to the people of the Anabaptist faith. 

And, as it has been in this way in many ages, per- 
haps this fact has had its effect in making our Ana- 
baptist folk such champions of religious liberty as 
we have ever been. Though religious liberty is most 
truly an idea of God’s holy word, and it must be that 
Anabaptists first found the thought in that book, 
for I am sure they could not have found the idea 
in any country on earth. But there are certain 
ideas of God’s word that came, through our per- 
sonal experiences, to be most firmly impressed 
upon us, and I think, through the oppression and 
persecution which we Anabaptists have received, 
this thought of religious freedom has laid hold on 
us, and so fired us with zeal that we have strug- 
gled more than other people to make the idea a 
reality. 


CHAPTER VI 


COUNTING THE COST 

N IMBEE-TONGUED and indignant Dame 
Burnet stood in the doorway talking to my 
mother. 

“They have found it out now. They have 
found it out,” declared our voluble neighbor. 
“Who would suppose that for a year and a half 
those New Testaments could be passing from 
hand to hand secretly ; and the bishop of Eondon, 
poor man, he having all his spies and informers 
hunting, and yet never find out till now how the 
books have been scattered. Such a trial as it 
must have been to the bishop. It’s the ‘ Christian 
brethren ’ that have been doing all the mischief. 
They have been sly, but they have been found out 
now. Farmers, peasants, tradesmen they are, even 
some priests doing such a thing as helping the 
New Testament around the country. But it is 
well found out. Crowds of country folk are being 
dragged in now, put in prison, or sent before the 
bishop’s court. The bishops will see that there 
are no more Testaments handed around.” 

“ It is terribly wicked to have a book like that 
in the house,” sighed my mother, shaking her 
head, as Dame Burnet paused for breath. 

6o 


COUNTING THK COST 


6l 


“Wicked!” shrieked Dame Burnet. “Why, 
all Biiglaiid seems to be going wicked. Some one 
was telling me that all Essex seems to have gone 
over to the New Testament, and in Eondon the 
books are for sale. But the people are getting 
scared. They will have to give up those books 
or go to prison or be burned. Something will 
happen, now that the bishop of Eondon has found 
out what he wanted to know. ’ ’ 

My mother moved a little uneasily. She was 
much more kind-hearted than Dame Burnet. 

“ I hope the bishops will not have to burn any- 
body, ” my mother answered, hesitatingly. ‘ ‘ They 
ought to burn the New Testaments of course, 
but ” 

She was interrupted by a scornful laugh. 

“Nothing is too bad for such folks,” asserted 
Dame Burnet. ‘ ‘ I was in Eondon seven years 
ago, in 1521, when the heretics were punished 
there. Even when they recanted, there was a 
time. Many are the heretics I have seen made to 
go three times around the market on market day, 
stand on the highest step of the cross there for a 
quarter of an hour with a fagot of wood on their 
shoulder ; and they had to go in the same way in 
a procession on Sunday ; and they were branded 
with a red-hot iron on the cheek ; and they must 
never in any way hide the mark. ’ ’ 

My mother shivered. 

“ Something had to be done,” expostulated 
Dame Burnet, noting the effect of her words. 


62 


IN editha’s days 


‘‘ Bishop Longland hunted up in that year nearly 
five hundred Gospellers. They used to do such 
awful things, those Gospellers! They would 
teach children Bible verses, and they would say 
the Ten Commandments, — which I never knew, 
and never will, — and they said, ‘ What need is 
there to go to the feet when we may go to the 
head ? ’ — meaning the priests by ‘ the feet,’ mind 
you, and the Bible or some such thing, by ‘ the 
head.’ And they would carry their books from 
one man to another, and read all night sometimes 
in a book, and some of them would eat on a fast- 
day, and they would never go on any pilgrimage, 
for they said the true pilgrimage was ‘ to go bare- 
foot and visit the poor and sick,’ — and much good 
it would do anybody to have such visitors.” 

My mother smiled. Dame Burnet was never 
herself so very welcome a visitor at our house, 
though my mother was ever kind and friendly. 

“And,” pursued Dame Burnet, “those Gos- 
pellers had pieces of the old Wycliffe English 
Bible, that almost no one could read and no one 
ought to, and they would not give the pieces up, 
or worship the Virgin and the saints ; but the 
Gospellers said, ‘Blessed be they that hear the 
word of God and keep it.’ Well, they got what 
they deserved I The bishop had the Gospellers 
torn out of their houses, and either burnt to death 
or else, if they recanted, they had to wear the 
fagot badge for life. Many is the one I had seen 
walking the street with the fagot badge on his 


COUNTING THE COST 


63 

clothes, and the mark of the burn of the iron on 
his cheek. And if the wicked heretics now don’t 
give up their New Testaments, we would like to 
see the same again.” 

The women paid no attention to me. They did 
not know that there swept before me a vision of 
the man I had directed to Neighbor Bid’s hut. 
The man’s cheek had a queer, dark mark. 

“That was it,” I thought. “He must have’ 
been burned once on his cheek, because he was a 
Gospeller. How it must have hurt. And he 
brought Neighbor Eld the Testament.” 

My very heart was quaking within me. What 
did burning people to death mean ? What would 
my mother say if she knew that father had a New 
Testament? A priest found out about Neighbor 
Bid’s first Testament. Could not some priest find 
out about my father’s Testament too? And my 
father was an Anabaptist. 

“ There are a good many of the butchers and 
tailors and carpenters among those ‘ Christian 
Brethren,’ who know they are suspected, and 
they are trying to get out of England,” declared 
Dame Burnet, as she made ready to go. “ They 
are trying to hide in the holds of ships, or else 
they are fixing themselves up so they think no one 
will know them. But they will not be a bit better 
off over in France or Belgium, for English folk 
can go over there and arrest them. ’ ’ 

Dame Burnet went away, but my spirits were 
made more dismal still by my aunt, Stephen’s 


64 


IN EDITHA’S days 


mother, who said she recollected that nine years 
ago, six men and a woman were burned at Coven- 
try, because they had taught their children and 
their servants the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, and 
the Ten Commandments in English. 

Alas ! I myself remembered enough of the 
New Testament to repeat under my breath some- 
times the Lord’s Prayer in English. It seemed so 
* pleasant to say words that 1 could understand, in- 
stead of praying in Latin. I was always terribly 
afraid though, that to punish me the saints would 
make me forget the Latin words, and my mother 
would find it out, and be shocked by my sudden 
ignorance. 

But I wondered that the saints and the Virgin 
would not just as lief hear me pray in English as 
in Latin. Was Latin so holy a language ? Or 
perhaps the saints did not understand English ? 

People who taught their children the Lord’s 
Prayer in English, had been burned. Did that 
mean that my father would be ? He was an Ana- 
baptist too. Was that worse ? I was so frightened 
that I burst into tears, and my aunt vainly tried 
to comfort me, blaming herself meanwhile for 
having spoken of such things. But I cried on and 
on till my mother in alarm declared that she be- 
lieved I was ill. 

Oh, if I only dared tell my mother what ailed 
me ! But I must never, never speak of the New 
Testament. 

“What is the matter?” queried my mother. 


COUNTING THE COST 65 

And at last I sobbed, “ Oh, father, father ! I am 
so afraid that something will happen to father.’^ 

My mother laughed a little, as she drew my 
head closely to her. 

“ Bditha, Editha,” she chided, gently. “ Noth- 
ing will happen to father. Silly little lass. Dame 
Burnet must not talk about things before you any 
more. I did not think you would feel so, Bditha.” 
And my mother patted my cheek, and kissed 
me, and then she went away, and cut a piece of 
cheese, and gave half to Stephen and half to me. 

This was a very great treat, and Stephen and I 
rejoiced over our dainty. But I could not be very 
merry, though I had cried away much of my 
terror. I resolved that I would beg my father that 
very night to dig a hole in the ground, and hide 
the New Testament instead of keeping it where 
it might be found. I looked about for a good 
place to dig the hole. 

“ Let us go to see the angel,” proposed Stephen, 
who of course did not know of what I was think- 
ing. 

I shook my head. 

“ You go,” I answered. 

I was glad enough to have him take a fancy to 
visit our one-winged friend. 

“ When Stephen is gone I will dig the hole, 
and have it ready before father comes,” I deter- 
mined. 

But Stephen refused to go without me, and he 
lingered near till 1 found that I could do nothing 
E 


66 


IN editha’s days 


about the hole but select with my eye what I 
thought would be a good spot among some weeds 
near our house. 

I clenched my small fists at the idea of any one 
daring to lay hold on my father and burn a great 
red place on his cheek, because he had a New 
Testament. 

“ He shall have a New Testament if he wants 
it,” I resolved, angrily. “Whatever he wants is 
right. And if — if they do burn his cheek ” — my 
courage was becoming faint again — “if they do 
burn his cheek, I will always love him, always, 
no matter how ugly the burn makes him look.” 

And I felt like crying again, only I diverted 
myself by thinking how I would hide my father’s 
New Testament for him, and never tell, no matter 
what happened. Oh, I would be very wonderfully 
brave indeed. 

But I found no opportunity that evening to say 
anything to my father about my plan of the hole, 
and the next day something happened that I had 
hardly expected. 

It was Sunday. It had been my father’s custom 
some times on Sundays to walk with me to some 
quiet place in the fields, and there read the New 
Testament and talk with me about what we read. 
And my father would there pray with me that the 
I/ord Jesus might take away my sins. 

But this afternoon my father stayed at home. 
My cousin Stephen was over at my aunt’s house 
of course with his mother, and I slipped outdoors 


COUNTING THE COST 


67 

alone, leaving my father and my mother together. 
After a short time I went into the house again, 
and I was surprised to see that my father was 
reading the New Testament My mother was 
sitting not far off, and she was crying silently. _ I 
went to her, and would have comforted her, but 
my father came too and put his arms around us 
both. We were very still, except that my mother 
sobbed once or twice. My father answered my 
inquiring look. 

“ Yes, Bditha,’’ he said softly ; “ mother knows 
about the New Testament. I told her last night 
after you were asleep. I thought it was time that 
mother knew.” 

My mother knew, and my mother was afraid. 
Or else why did she cry so ? 

But oh, I was so glad that she knew. It had 
been so hard to have to keep a secret from one’s 
own mother. 

“Oh, father,” I burst forth ; “do hide the New 
Testament in a hole. I will help you dig.” 

My father looked at me. 

“ Bditha,” he replied, “ do not speak about the 
New Testament before Stephen or your aunt. 
We three, you and mother and I, may talk of it to 
one another all we please, quietly. Bet us read to 
mother, you and I, Bditha.” 

And my mother, though apparently terrified at 
what she was doing, listened to me as I read some- 
what stumblingly. And then my father read to 
us. His voice was calm and soothing, and my 


68 


IN kditha’s days 


mother stopped crying and listened with a good 
deal of interest after a while. She even asked a 
few questions about what he read. 

At last she asked, as one who had made up her 
mind to accept the worst : ‘ ‘ Are you going to be 
one of the ‘ Christian Brethren ’ ? ” 

My father hesitated. 

“ I am one with them in loving the New Testa- 
ment already, dear lass,’’ he answered, slowly ; 
“ but there is another matter that Neighbor Bid 
and I have often talked of. If I do as I think this 
New Testament bids, I shall be more than one of 
the ‘ Christian Brethren. ’ ” 

My mother was silent, but she looked fixedly at 
him. He smiled tenderly, but his eyes filled with 
tears. 

“ I have read this New Testament from end to 
end times over,” he went on, “ and neither Neigh- 
bor Kid nor I could find in it anything about 
praying to the saints, or about purgatory, or about 
praying for the dead. So I knew I must cut loose 
from the priests.” 

My father stopped a moment, but my mother 
still said nothing. 

“Neighbor Bid believed that he did not find 
something else in the New Testament,” continued 
my father. “ And indeed I cannot find it there 
myself ; and that is the way the priests do baptize 
us when we are babies, and bring us afterward 
into the church, and so there is first no change 
of heart in us. For the New Testament tells us 


COUNTING THE COST 


69 

plainly to repent and be baptized, and Neighbor 
Bid said to me that a wee baby cannot repent, and 
that is true enough. The reason why Neighbor 
Bid was first thinking about that was this : When 
he was a boy, his grandfather lived in Oxford, and 
he used to tell him about some men and women 
that were whipped through Oxford streets years 
ago. There were about thirty of them, and they 
called themselves ‘ Publicans,’ which was probably 
a corruption of the term ‘ Paulicians.’ They had 
come over to Bngland from Gascony, and they 
had with them a pastor named Gerard. 

“ Henry II. was King of Bngland then, and he 
heard about these Publicans that the priests 
were all against, but King Henry was so just 
he would not let the poor people be punished 
without a hearing. And so there came together 
a council of popish bishops of Oxford to try these 
men and women. The pastor, Gerard, spoke 
for them. He told the bishops that he and his 
company were Christians and that they held the 
doctrines of the apostles. But when the bishops 
asked more questions, it was found that the Pub- 
licans did not believe in purgatory, or in prayers 
for the dead, or in praying to saints, or in the bap- 
tism of babies, or in the changing of the bread 
and wine of the sacrament into the body and 
blood of Christ. 

‘ ‘ The bishops tried to argue, but they could do 
nothing with their words, for the Publicans 
would not admit anything contrary to the word 


70 


IN EDITHA’S days 


of God, though they were only poor peasants. 
The bishops were so angry that they reported to 
King Henry that the Publicans were obstinate 
heretics, worthy of death. And King Henry was so 
influenced by the priests that he sentenced all the 
Publicans to be branded with a red-hot iron on 
their foreheads, as heretics ; to be publicly 
whipped through the streets of Oxford ; and after- 
ward to be put to death. And nobody should 
show the Publicans any kindness or comfort, for 
he who did would be punished.” 

There was indignation in my mother’s face, but 
still she said nothing. 

“It was done this way,” continued my father, 
with a sigh. “ Their foreheads were burnt ; the 
minister had a mark burnt on his chin as well as 
his forehead ; the Publicans were driven out of 
the city with loud sounding stripes and the 
hedges and fields were covered with snow, as it 
was winter then, and the men, and women, and 
children of the Publicans all died in the fields 
of cold and hunger, for no one showed them any 
kindness.” 

My mother drew a long breath. 

“ It was cruel ! ” she murmured. 

“ The Publicans rejoiced as they went out to 
die,” concluded my father, in a low tone. “ The 
pastor, Gerard, went before them, singing some 
words that Neighbor Bid found forme in the New 
Testament. They are ‘ Blessed are ye when all 
men shall hate you. ’ ” 


COUNTING THE COST 


71 


There was a long pause. 

“Oh, I wish,” broke out my father vehemently, 
‘ ‘ I wish the time might ever come when every 
man in England might worship God as he thought 
right ! Freedom ! Freedom ! That is what we 
want ! Freedom to pray to God and worship him 
and read our New Testaments as he has com- 
manaed us ! ” 

My father arose excitedly. He started to leave 
the house, when my mother stopped him. 

“ You did not tell us,” she reminded him, “ why 
it was you told us about the Publicans. Was 
Neighbor Eld one? Are you one? ” 

Her eyes looked at him as though she would 
read his soul. My father returned her gaze with 
equal solemnity. He knew what a heart-wrench 
his words must give her. 

“They are not called Publicans now,” he re- 
plied. “ They are called Anabaptists. Neighbor 
Eld was one. I am one in my belief, though I 
have never yet been baptized as the New Testa- 
ment tells me to be, and as I yet hope to be.” 

“But it is dangerous to read the New Testa- 
ment,” expostulated my mother, her voice trem- 
bling. 

“Yes,” agreed my father. “ More than a hun- 
dred years ago, under King Henry IV., after John 
Wycliffe had been dead many years, the clergy 
came together and made a law that ‘ the transla- 
tion of the text of Holy Scripture out of one 
tongue into another is a dangerous thing. 


72 


IN kditha’s days 


Therefore,’ said they, ‘ we decree and ordain that 
no one henceforth do, by his own authority, 
translate any text of the Holy Scriptures into the 
English tongue.’ The clergy said though, that 
translations might be read if they were approved 
by the bishops or by a council. But no such 
translations have ever been approved in all these 
years ! It is no new thing that the priests should 
hate to let us common folk have the Holy Script- 
ure. But we must have it ! A man’s conscience 
has a right to be free ! ” 

My mother was not a woman to oppose her hus- 
band, deeply as she had been shocked to find a 
New Testament in our home. She had too long 
been accustomed to submission to others in relig- 
ious matters to rise in defiance now, and declare 
that the dreaded New Testament must not be al- 
lowed in the house. 

I could readily see that it would have been a 
great relief to her to have burned the book, but my 
father’s will was her law, and, much as she might 
grieve, many prayers as she might make to the 
saints about this matter, she would keep the pos- 
session of the book a secret, even though she 
thought she endangered her soul by not confess- 
ing this thing to the priests. My mother would 
have gone to the stake with my father, but at 
this time it would have been for love of him, not 
for love of the New Testament or of the Eord 
Jesus. 

I noticed how my mother would shrink after 


COUNTING THB COST 73 

this, every time that my aunt spoke of those who 
read the New Testament. 

“ Such people are very stubborn, I have heard,” 
asserted my aunt, one day ; “but sometimes a good 
many of them come back to their senses, and re- 
cant, and obey the priests again ! I remember 
there was a year, a good while ago, when I was a 
girl, that the folk called the year of the great ab- 
juration, because so many heretics recanted. Per- 
haps such a year will come again.” 

My mother answered nothing, and I was sure 
that in her heart she did not believe that my 
father would ever recant. He had too well 
counted the cost of defying the priests before he 
ever told my mother of his change in belief. He 
would never go back to the priests and friars, no 
matter what might come to pass. 

After the Sunday when we first read the New 
Testament to my mother, my father daily read a 
little to us at home. It seems to me but a short 
time after this, as I look back, and yet I know 
it must have been in the autumn of the next year, 
that the Bishop of London, Bishop Tuiistall, re- 
turned from a mission to Cambray, and brought 
with him all of the New Testaments that he had 
been able to buy in Antwerp. Bishop Tuiistall 
made a great bonfire of the New Testaments at 
Cheapside. 

Of course this was exciting to the English peo- 
ple, but it was a foolish thing to do, for the money 
that Bishop Tuns tall had paid for the New Tes- 


74 


IN editha’s days 


taments went another way from which he would 
like. The money went to pay for printing a new 
edition of the New Testament, and thousands of 
corrected copies were secretly brought into Eng- 
land very soon. But I run on before my story. 

“Do you think,” my mother asked my aunt 
one day, “ if a person paid the priests a great deal 
of money, that they would let a heretic alone ? ” 

My aunt promptly shook her head 

“No,” she answered. “ Have you forgotten 
how years ago there was a a rich man, Robert 
Bartlet, who had to lose his faim and his goods, 
and he was kept a prisoner in the monastery of 
Ashrigg for seven years, with a badge upon his 
right sleeve ? ” 

“Yes,” responded my mother slowly, “I re- 
member.” 

But while the priests did all they could against 
those whom the Romish clergy called heretics, 
some of the good people across the sea in the 
Low Countries had a scheme of their own for in- 
troducing the New Testament more widely into 
England. About Christmas time, 1528, this 
scheme was working beautifully. New Testa- 
ments, hidden in loads of corn, an eatable very 
much needed in England just then, came to our 
country. A bookseller of Antwerp, named John 
Raimond, had printed a fourth edition of the New 
Testament, more beautiful, my father said, than 
the former Testaments, for this kind had pictures, 
and each page was bordered with red lines. 


COUNTING THE COST 


75 


The sacks of corn, with New Testaments in- 
side them, passed bravely on ; but alas ! certain 
priests and monks, always prying around, discov- 
ered that the sacks were not all corn ! The priests 
forthwith carried several copies of this New Tes- 
tament to the bishop of Ivondon. Now the book- 
seller, John Raimond, instead of staying home in 
Antwerp, had come over to England on board one 
of the ships with five hundred copies of his New 
Testament, and when the bishop of London heard 
what the priests had to say, he laid hands on Rai- 
mond, and threw him into prison. But the bishop 
could not get many of the pretty, red-lined New 
Testaments. They went everywhere, and the 
New Testament was explained in frequent con- 
venticles in the city of London, and the priests 
were so disgusted that they said : “It is sufficient 
only to enter London to become a heretic ! ” 

No wonder that in the autumn of 1529, Bishop 
Tunstall took all the English New Testaments 
that he had been able to buy in Antwerp, and 
made his great bonfire ! A pretty amusement that 
was for a bishop ! But such bonfires would light 
in men’s hearts a fire that would not be put out. 

My father still read his New Testament. Won- 
derful words he found there, and much reasoning 
went on in his mind. One day when I found 
him reading, he put his arm about me, and read a 
few words more, and then he said to me : “Ah, 
Editha, I have not done all that the Lord com- 
mands me ! This word says, ‘ Repent, and be bap- 


76 IN editha’s days 

tized.’ I have repented, but I have not been bap- 
tized. ’ ’ 

“ Not when you were a baby, father? ” I asked, 
in surprise. “Why, I was.’’ 

“‘Therefore are we buried with him,’” mur- 
mured my father. “Jesus went up out of the 
water. It is not a drop of holy water on one’s 
forehead, but a burial. Neighbor Bid and I used 
to talk of it often. He made it so plain.” 

My father stopped. Then he seemed to re- 
member my question. 

“When I was a baby?” he repeated. “When 
I was so small that I did not know how to repent ? 
Yes, I was handed to the priest, but the New Tes- 
tament says ‘ repent ’ comes first. That is what 
Neighbor Bid used to say, and it is true enough. 
And Tyndale, the man who wrote out the New 
Testament in Bnglish, says, ‘ The plunging into 
the water signifieth that we die and are buried 
with Christ ; and the pulling out again signifieth 
that we rise again with Christ in a new life.’ 
Did I do that when I was a baby, baptized by the 
priest, Bditha? Was my life different after bap- 
tism ? I had not repented ; I was too little to be- 
lieve. Why should the priest have baptized me ? 
Why should I count that baptism as aught now ? ” 

I could not answer. I was puzzled by his 
words. 

“Bditha,” continued my father gently, “has 
mother said to you that she wished I would not 
become an Anabaptist ? ’ ’ 


COUNTING THE COST 


77 


The tears were in his eyes. 

“No,” I answered, “no. She has not said so 
to me. ’ ’ 

For my mother would never have spoken so of 
my father to me. But I silently remembered that 
last Ash-Wednesday father had not gone to have 
any ashes cast upon him, and afterward my aunt 
had said something to my mother about my 
father’s absence, and my mother had cried. I 
knew, though she did not say so, that my mother 
wished my father had been among those people 
whom the priest absolved, and on whom he after- 
ward cast ashes. My father was becoming a 
marked man. 


CHAPTER VII 


THK FAGOT retreat 

1529 “ T WONDER how much money mother 
A.D. 1 gel- to-morrow,” I said to 

Stephen. “To-morrow is Hoke-day.” 

“Tuesday is Hoke-day,” disputed Stephen. 

“Tuesday for the men, but to-morrow for the 
women,” I corrected him. “ I wonder how much 
money mother will get to-morrow ! ” 

“ The priests will want her to get a great deal,” 
answered Stephen. 

It was two weeks after Easter, and it was the 
custom that when Hoke-tide came, the women 
would take cords, and go out into the streets and 
roads and stop all the men who passed, and bind 
them with the cords, not loosing such prisoners 
till they had paid a little amount of money. 
The men, on another day would take cords and 
treat the women in the same way. 

It was rude sport, but the money gained in this 
way was given to the priests as an offering to the 
church. There was a supper, and Stephen and I 
liked the merriment. But my father, who grew, 
it seemed, daily more uneasy under the rule of the 
priests had said lately that he could wish that 
my mother would not raise any money in this way 
78 


THE FAGOT retreat 


79 


on Hoke-day. But my mother laughed lightly at 
his misgivings and warned him that if he were 
not brisk this Hoke-tide, she would be more suc- 
cessful than he in getting money. My father 
smiled at her merry tone, though his eyes looked 
distressed. 

My father did not intend to raise any money for 
the priests this Hoke-tide. I think my mother 
knew that very well. She spoke light-heartedly 
enough, but she was really in dread of what the 
priests would say, and she strove to make up by 
her own unusual zeal the lack of interest that 
my father showed. She hoped to ward off the 
displeasure of the priests for a time longer. And 
yet I believe she felt a thrill of terror, thinking 
that she could not always continue to shield her 
husband. But she did help the other women get 
much money for the priests that Hoke-tide. 

It was a number of months after this when my 
father became aware that the priests strongly sus- 
pected him. It was little wonder, for my father 
had absented himself from service, not going to 
matins, or mass, or vespers, and nevermore mak- 
ing confession to the priest. No marvel that fierce 
eyes were on my father and mischief was plotted 
against him. 

“ I must go into hiding,” I overheard my 
father tell my mother one night, after I was in 
bed. 

My aunt and Stephen were gone away at this 
time on a pilgrimage with some others to see the 


8o 


IN editha’s days 


relics at the shrine of Reading-, and I think my 
father thought that he would do better to hide 
while she was away, so that if necessary his place 
of concealment might be a secret to her even — 
for my aunt was more obedient to the priests and 
more under their control than my mother, and 
though my aunt liked my father very well, yet 
there was no telling whether if he were hiding, 
and she knew the place where he was hidden, and 
a priest should command her to tell where it was, 
she might not obey. My aunt had been zealous 
over her pilgrimage and had urged us to go too, 
for over at Reading people said there were many, 
many relics, bits of the arms of St. Pancrates, St. 
Quentin, St. David, Mary Salome, and St. Ed- 
ward the Martyr, and a bone of Mary Magdalene. 

“I must go into hiding,” repeated my father. 
“The priests suspect me.” 

“Oh, Ralph,” begged my mother; “give up 
the Testament. It will lead you into trouble. It 
has led so many to death ! The priests will never 
stop hunting you, if once they really begin. 
Give up the New Testament ! Think of Editha. 
Think of me. How can we live without you? 
The priests will kill you ! I hear dreadful things 
from the neighbor folk of how matters go else- 
where. I am afraid for you all the time. Eet 
me burn the book, and do you go to church and 
to confession as you used to. Do not be an Ana- 
baptist. Oh, do not ! I am afraid for you ! ” 

She wept softly and he tried to soothe her. 


THE FAGOT RETREAT 


8l 


“You were not shriven at Slirove-tide,” she 
sobbed. “If you had only gone to the priest 
then, penance might have saved you. Oh, Ralph, 
I have prayed so much to the saints for you ! ’’ 

She tried to check her sobs. 

“ Poor little wife ! Poor, mistaken little wife ! ’’ 
murmured my father brokenly. ‘ ‘ If you only 
knew ” 

“ Even now,” urged my mother, “ if you should 
go to the priest and confess everything, he would 
forgive you, if you did penance. I am sure he 
would ! Will you not go, Ralph ? ” 

I listened to hear what my father would reply. 
Perhaps I ought not to have listened, but child 
though I was, I had heard Neighbor Bid and my 
father discuss the church of Rome enough so that 
I know my father could never be an honest Papist 
again as he had once been. 

There was a long silence till my father spoke, 
his voice yet trembling. 

“ I have confessed my sins to God,” replied my 
father, “and I have absolution through Jesus 
Christ our Lord.” 

I could hear my mother sobbing and pleading 
for a long while and my father answering her 
kindly, and yet I knew that he had not changed 
his decision. 

By-and-by father came softly to my bed, and 
knelt down and kissed me gently, as if he was 
afraid of waking me. But I was wide awake, 
and I put my arms around his neck, and he said : 

F 


82 


IN EDITHA’S days 


‘‘Good night, Editha. Father is going to hide 
in the big fagot pile, and you must not tell any- 
body where he is.’* 

“Are you going to take the Testament?” I 
questioned, trying to see his face in the dark. 

“Yes,” he answered, “I have it. Good-bye, 
Editha.” 

And then he almost sobbed, as he murmured : 
“ Oh, Editha, Editha ! May I live to see a Testa- 
ment in every home in England, and all the wee 
ones, like my own little girl, free to read it ! ” 

He kissed me again and went away. 

There was a great quantity of fagots heaped up, 
a little back of our house, and during the night 
my father constructed a kind of hollow hiding- 
place inside the large pile. In this place he hid, 
having taken with him some food and clothes, 
together with the New Testament. 

After this, sometimes by night I would climb 
the pile of fagots and hide in the big hole with 
father, whispering to him all the news I could 
remember. He had fixed the fagots over his 
head so that his hiding place was quite well con- 
cealed. 

Once in the daytime I was near the large 
pile getting a few fagots for mother to bum, 
when suddenly one of our priests appeared near 
me. 

“Did your father go with your aunt and the 
others on the pilgrimage to the Gray Friars at 
Reading? ” he asked. 


THE FAGOT retreat 83 

And when I tremblingly answered “No,” the 
priest looked sternly at me, and hesitated. 

“ He went not on that pilgrimage? ” questioned 
the priest, transfixing me with his piercing gaze. 
“ But he is not at home. I have not seen him in 
the village. He went not on that pilgrimage ? ” 

“No,” I said, trembling so with fear that I 
could hardly keep from bursting into tears. 

Then the priest went away as swiftly as he had 
come. 

I had expected that he would climb the big 
fagot pile and find father. I knew better than to 
climb the fagot pile myself in the daytime, even 
though the priest had disappeared, but I dropped 
my two fagots and ran into the house and told 
mother what had happened. 

After this my father began to think that per- 
haps we might try to escape from England, as so 
many other folks were attempting to do, but we 
hardly knew how to accomplish it, and we knew 
that King Henry could send and take us, even if 
we fled from his realm. 

“Oh,” I thought, “I wish we could fly as well 
as the one-winged angel did. Then we could fly 
safely out of England some night, and father 
could carry his Testament with him, and no one 
would ever know where we went.” 

This exceedingly impossible childish wish 
exercised my imagination a great deal, but was of 
no practical avail. 

It was in this year that King Henry published 


84 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


a proclamation against the “Gospelers,” with a 
list of English books that were forbidden. When 
my father heard of it, he repeated something that 
William Tyndale said once about perceiving by 
experience “ how that it was impossible to estab- 
lish the lay people in any truth except the Script- 
ures were plainly laid before their eyes in their 
mother-tongue.” 

My aunt and Stephen came back from their 
pilgrimage, and in my hearing my aunt said not 
a word about my father’s disappearance. My 
mother must have said something to my aunt, but 
I did not know what. If Stephen had been like 
some boys, I should have been afraid of his find- 
ing out about father’s being in the fagot heap. 
But Stephen was not a boy to do much discover- 
ing. He was a very dreamy sort of a person, and 
would rather watch pilgrims come to and go from 
the shrine of our town, and listen to the tales 
they told, and note the wonder at our one-winged 
angel, than be prying around our fagot pile. 

Stephen was much delighted with the pilgrim- 
age that he and his mother had made to Reading, 
and he told me of having seen the monument of 
the first King Henry, at the abbey of that place. 

“ A woman pilgrim there told me a story,” 
Stephen informed me. “ She said there used to be 
a man that the first King Henry made a prisoner, 
and the king was angry because the man had 
written some verses that laughed at the king. 
And King Henry was so wicked that he said the 


the; fagot rftreat 


85 


man’s eyes must be put out ; and when they were 
doing it, it hurt so that the man hit his head 
against the prison wall and it killed him. Cousin 
Bditha, would our King Henry put out a man’s 
eyes ? ’ ’ 

“ I don’t know,” I answered, remembering some 
of the dreadful things that Dame Burnet had 
mentioned. 

But Stephen had already turned to another 
idea. 

“ Cousin Bditha,” he asked, “don’t the saints 
want their arms any more? ” 

“ I don’t know,” I repeated. 

“ There were so many arms of the saints at the 
Gray Friars,” went on Stephen ; “ I suppose the 
saints left their arms there for the friars to take 
care of.” 

I said nothing. I was a little envious that 
Stephen should have seen so much more than I 
had. But I reflected that at least Stephen had 
never seen a New Testament, and I had, although 
I dared not boast of that to Stephen, to offset his 
tales of what he had seen on his pilgrimage. 1 
reflected, furthermore, that I knew about the 
Anabaptists, and Stephen did not know. I was 
certainly a great deal wiser than he about them, 
for my father had told me all he knew about the 
persecutions the Anabaptists had endured, and 
how such people loved and read the New Testa- 
ment, and believed that no king has a right to 
take God’s word from the common classes of men 


86 


IN editha’s days 


who need it so much. But I sighed as I thought 
that I must keep silent about all my knowledge, 
and so had nothing wise wherewith to amaze 
Stephen. Though he would have been amazed 
indeed, if he had known what my father said to 
me one night in the fagot hole, when he had been 
telling me what the Anabaptists had endured in 
the past in our country and in other lands. 

“Bditha,” whispered my father, “ the Anabap- 
tists have had a glorious history in the past. 
They will have a glorious history in the future. 
Oh, my child ! shall not you and I be worthy of that 
history ? Shall we not do our part in the struggle 
for religious freedom ? It will come some day, 
Kditha, this freedom we Anabaptists want for all 
men. Then no man will have to hide in a fagot 
pile because he reads the New Testament and 
believes that none but those who have repented 
and believed should be baptized. Then every 
man shall be at liberty to worship God as he 
thinks right. Editha, I know that day of freedom 
will come, and I am proud to think what part the 
sacrifice of Anabaptist suffering and toil, yea, the 
sacrifice of Anabaptist lives themselves, will have 
in bringing freedom to the world ! 


CHAPTER VIII 


NEWS 

1 HAD climbed to the top of the fagot pile. It 
was so dark that mother thought no one would 
see me. I had been very careful not to make any 
more noise than I could help in climbing over 
the fagots. I was particularly careful also of 
some hard-boiled eggs. My own hen had laid 
the eggs, and I had boiled them. Mother always 
took the tenth egg for the priests ; but she had 
taken all such eggs from her own store that I 
might have every single one for father. I was full 
of joy that I could carry him such a present. 

I was holding my breath, and I had climbed 
as softly as might be to the very top of the fagot 
pile, when I heard a noise behind me, and looking 
toward the house, my eyes, grown accustomed to 
the darkness, faintly discerned two men stealthily 
coming around the corner. I crouched silently on 
the fagots, for I was very much frightened. 

“ They are after father ! ” was my thought. 
By-and-by the two men disappeared around the 
house, and I, crouching there, afraid to stir, heard 
them knock on our door. I moved a little farther. 

“ Father ! ” I whispered, putting my face down 
to the hole. 


87 


88 


IN editha’s days 


For an answer I felt a hand reach out near me, 
and I gave him my basket. He set it down in- 
side, and then almost noiselessly moved some fagots 
and lifted me into his place of hiding. 

“ Oh, father ! ” I whispered. “ Two men are after 
you ! ” 

I told him what I had heard and seen. He tried 
to calm me, saying that the men were not seeking 
him. And then I told him about the hard-boiled 
eggs, and he thanked me and said that I was a good, 
good girl to remember him, and he wanted me to 
stroke my hen for him the next day. He took 
one of the hard-boiled eggs and ate it, more to 
please and reassure me, I suppose, than to satisfy 
his own hunger. 

We listened all the time, but heard nothing 
from the house, and at last father began to whis- 
per to me without listening much more for out- 
side sounds. He whispered, as was his wont, about 
the things he had read in the New Testament. 
And he had me feel with my hand, since I could 
not see, a place he had fixed among the fagots 
where he might hide the New Testament. 

“ I have been thinking much,” he told me, “ that 
it would not be right if I should have to go away 
somewhere else to hide, that I should carry the 
New Testament with me. For if I should be 
taken, Fditha, and if I could never come back 
here again, the men who captured me would 
take the New Testament too, and then the last 
way in which you might ever able to see 


NEWS 


89 

God’s word might be gone. You might never be 
where you could get another Testament, Editha, 
and I cannot have my child grow up without 
knowing the way to heaven. So, Editha, if some- 
time you do not find me among these fagots, you 
may know that the New Testament is here, hid- 
den in this little spot. Read the book, Editha. 
It is God’s word for his people, and no king has a 
right to say that common folk shall not be free to 
read it. The Lord sent it to the common folk, 
and woe to the priests who keep it from them. 

“ And I think,” continued my father, “ that the 
answer that John Wycliffe once gave is a good an- 
swer in these days. He said, ‘ The clergy cry aloud 
that it is heresy to speak of the Holy Scriptures in 
English, and so they would condemn the Holy 
Ghost who gave it in tongues to the apostles of 
Christ, to speak the word of God in all languages 
under heaven.’ ” 

I stayed with my father longer than usual, for 
he hardly dared let me go back to the house, 
lest those two men should see me. And before he 
lifted me out of the hole he whispered a prayer to 
the Lord Jesus that I might be safe. My father 
told me to pray too, and I did pray that nobody 
might see me, or might think that father was 
hidden in the fagot pile. Then father and I kissed 
each other and father lifted me out, and I crept 
down the fagot pile very softly, on the side away 
from the house, and then I went on tip-toe toward 
pur door, and at last dared go in. 


90 


IN editha’s days 


Mother said the men had been after father. She 
looked very pale, and I knew she had been crying, 
but I tojd her that father said the kord Jesus would 
keep us safe from harm. No one disturbed our 
household all night long after that ; but I think 
my mother did not sleep much. 

So the remaining months of that year wore 
away, my father hiding among the fagots. Some- 
times, on the coldest nights, he came into the 
house. Several times men came to search, but 
they never came when he was elsewhere than in 
the great fagot pile, and no one seemed to suspect 
its secret ; but my father felt that any day his re- 
treat might be discovered, and he thought it best 
that he should try to find a hiding-place at a dis- 
tance from our town. 

“ There must be coverts in the fields where a 
man might hide from the priests,” judged my 
father. “ If I cannot bide in such places, I will 
come back to the fagot pile.” 

So one night he fled, and my mother grieved 
till she was well-nigh heart-broken. 

It was while my father was gone that the Lord 
1530 High Chancellor Sir Thomas More, with 
the great ecclesiastics, issued a declaration 
against all English translations of the Scriptures. 
The first day I heard of that, I rashly climbed the 
fagot pile in the daytime, and boldly dropped my- 
self down into the big hole where my father had 
not been hidden for a fortnight. I felt around in 
the fagots till I found the New Testament where 


NEWS 


91 


my father said he would leave it. The great High 
Chancellor did not know that he had sent a child 
into a fagot heap to read the New Testament. 

So there I sat for a long time poring over the 
book, and reading to myself such portions as I 
knew best. I found the place where was the 
prayer I read to old Neighbor Bid, the day before 
he died : “ Oure Father which arte in heven, hal- 
owed be thy name. Let thy kingdom come. Thy 
wyll be fulfilled, as well in erth, as hit ys in heven. 
Geve vs this daye oure dayly breade. And for- 
geve vs oure treaspases, even as we forgeve them 
which treaspas vs. Leede vs not into temptacion, 
but delyvre vs from yvell. Amen.” 

I stayed in the fagot pile longer than I intended, 
but the reason was I did not find it so easy to climb 
out as I had anticipated. The hole was somewhat 
deep, and my footing a little insecure in making my 
exit. But I succeeded at last, and came hastily down 
from the fagot pile, much defiance of Sir Thomas 
More within my soul. I had done just what Sir 
Thomas said I should not do. I was triumphant ! 
There was no right spirit of Bible reading within 
me. I wanted to read only because my father’s 
enemy had said I should not. I did not know 
that over in Hamburg, across the sea, this same 
year William Tyndale was printing his transla- 
tion of the five books of Moses. I had no knowl- 
edge, as I went back to the house from the fagot 
pile, that any additional part of the Bible w^s to 
be made ready for Bnglish folk. 


92 


IN editha’s days 


“Where have you been, Editha?” asked my 
mother, when I came in. “ Stephen wanted to 
find you, but I could not tell him where you 
were.” 

* “I was in the fagot pile reading the New Tes- 
tament,” I whispered in her ear. 

My mother started. 

“Did father leave the book there?” she ques- 
tioned softly. 

“Yes,” I answered. “ He showed me where he 
would hide it. He wanted me to read it.” 

“ Editha,” and my mother spoke slowly, after a 
little pause, “the next time you go to the fagot 
pile, you may bring me the New Testament, if 
father is not there. I will read it a little, per- 
haps.” 

And often, after I brought her the book, I used 
to come across my mother secretly reading the 
New Testament. Mother carried the book around 
with her, and at night we hid it in our bed, 
and she and I talked in whispers about the 
strange things in the New Testament. After 
a while my mother showed the New Testament to 
my aunt, but instead of reading it at all, my 
aunt was so indignant at such a book being in 
our house that, if it had not been for the love she 
bore my mother, I believe the priests would have 
heard of this defiance of their authority. 

From about this time, my mother ceased telling 
me saints’ tales. Not that she had ceased to be- 
lieve in the saints, but I think she had read 


NEWS 


93 


enough of the New Testament to see that much 
of what she had thought true did not agree with 
that book, and she would think before talking 
much more about her past teaching. But my 
aunt told Stephen and me many saints’ tales, with 
a sort of indignant emphasis that I thought I 
understood. She was not going to be deceived 
by the New Testament. But she was very pru- 
dent, and never once mentioned the book before 
rhe. Of course, Stephen knew nothing of it, and 
nothing of all my thinking and wondering about 
the Anabaptists. 

One day, when father had been gone a good 
while and when mother was growing thin and 
worn day by day as she spun her wool, there came 
an unusual number of pilgrims to the shrine of 
our town, and Stephen and I went out to watch 
them. Among the villagers who looked on was 
one woman, ever spiteful with her tongue, and she 
came near me, and smiled and whispered : 
“ Editha, when you go home, tell your mother 
that one of the pilgrims says she saw your father 
taken by the officers.” 

I gazed at her with widely open, terrified eyes, 
and then leaving Stephen I ran home, stifling my 
sobs as much as possible. A kind-hearted neigh- 
bor asked me what ailed me, and a boy said that a 
pilgrim had struck me, but I did not pause to give 
any answer. I ran on till I found my mother in 
the house, and sobbed out the news to her. 

“ Who told you ? ” she said, white and stern. 


94 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


And when I spoke the woman’s name, my 
mother declared : ‘‘ I will not believe it ! I do 
not believe that any pilgrim told her such a thing ! 
It is her own spite. ” 

Ivate that night my mother left the house, and 
went to the fagot pile. She had never failed to 
look there since my father went away, for she 
hoped for his return at any time. Little did I ex- 
pect the news she brought back this night, how- 
ever. I had thought she was a long time away, 
and I, worn out with the fright and crying of the 
day, was very nearly asleep when she came softly 
in, and creeping beside me, kissed me and whis- 
pered : “ Editha, father is among the fagots 
again. Father has come back.” 

“Oh!” I cried. 

Half asleep, I sat up, and my mother whis- 
pered to me the story, how father had been taken 
by some officers, but as they went on with him 
they came to a drinking-place, and going in 
they began to drink. When they had drunk a 
good deal, they fell asleep, and father, slipping 
out, hid from them. They waked and tried to 
find him, but he had hidden in a holly bush and 
was not discovered, and now he had come safely 
home again, and would stay awhile in the pile of 
fagots. Mother had given him some supper, and 
had carried him the New Testament, and father 
had sent me a kiss, and he would be very glad to 
rest and read a little, for he was very worn with 
travel and lack of food. 


NEWS 


95 


Oh, how long the next day seemed till night 
came, and I could climb the fagot pile and see 
father again ! And how glad he was to see me ! 

So began again our watching over the fagot 
pile that no one might find father’s retreat. My 
father brought us much news of how matters 
stood in Hngland. He said that there were men 
who were being forced to abjure, and he had 
heard of a man, John Ryburne, of a place in the 
diocese of I^incoln, who had been accused by his 
own sister of saying that the church service was 
corrupt. Others of the same place were com- 
pelled to abjure, and a man named Thomas Hitton, 
was burned in Kent, and John Tyndale was in 
trouble for sending money to his brother beyond 
sea, and a man named John Tyler, for oppos- 
ing purgatory, and another named Thomas Cur- 
son, for disregarding monkery and for having an 
English Testament; and a man named Thomas 
Cornwall was condemned to always be in prison, 
because he tore off his badge after he had borne a 
fagot. But Thomas Cornwall escaped. And one, 
Thomas Philip, was in trouble too, for he had 
Tracy’s Testament, and ate butter in Lent. 

My father told us also that there was a preacher 
named Eatimer, who had been a believer in Rom- 
ish superstition, but had been converted, and had 
become eager for the conversion of others. He 
had begun preaching at Cambridge, where he was 
also a private instructor in the university, and his 
sermons had been so pointed against the foolish- 


IN editha’s days 


96 

ness of praying in the Latin tongue and keeping 
the people in ignorance, that several of the resi- 
dent friars and heads of houses had spoken against 
him. But he had silenced them by his severe 
criticisms and eloquent arguments the last Christ- 
mastide. 

And John Skelton, the poet who had written 
such rhymes about the friars and the bishops was 
dead, my father brought word. He would never 
again write rhymes mocking the friars. 

So my father had much news to tell, and none 
of it, as far as we saw, was very encouraging to 
those people who cared for the New Testament, 
except that it was a good thing the preacher 
Latimer had been converted. 

My father had once told me of an archbishop 
of Mainz, who lived many, many years ago, and 
who, finding a Bible, and looking into it, said : 
“ Of a truth I do not know what book this is, but 
I perceive everything in it is against us.” 

I wondered if some of the friars now, who 
thought the New Testament so dreadful a book 
for common people, ever read it, or whether the 
friars had read it and knew it was against them, 
and so were not willing that the English people 
should read it for themselves in their own tongue ? 

We rejoiced greatly that father was where we 
could see him again, and know where he was. I 
was so full of joy that I could hardly keep from 
telling Stephen. But that would never do. 

We expected that the officers who had lost 


NEWS 


97 


father after capturing him might come and search 
our house. But, for some reason, perhaps because 
they did not know in what part of the country his 
home was, perhaps because they did not even 
know his name, they did not appear. And, after 
a while, father would come into the house some- 
times secretly, to help mother by carding the 
wool that she spun. And sometimes father would 
hear me read some verses from the New Testa- 
ment as he worked. And then he would go back 
and hide in the fagot pile again. 

One day, I remember father told me that there 
had been an edict published over across the sea in 
Zurich, that any who should baptize by immer- 
sion should be put to death. Some Anabaptists 
had been taken under this law, and tied back to 
back and thrown into the water ; some had been 
burnt alive, and many starved in prison. 

I was greatly impressed by this news, but after- 
ward finding that Zurich was a very long way 
from England, I did not so much care for the 
edict, since my father assured me it had no force 
in our own country. 

But my father told me that the Roman Catho- 
lics eveiy where had always hated and persecuted 
the Anabaptists, and that I must never expect a 
priest to have any other feeling than a particular 
hatred toward us. 

“ It is not to be wondered at that Zurich drowns 
Anabaptists, since the reformer Zwingli, there, 
has been so taught by the Catholic church,” 
G 


98 


IN liDlTHA’S DAYS 


remarked my father. “ He does not clearly see 
in all things yet. I trust God leads him. Al- 
though indeed, Editha, hundreds of years ago, 
the Catholics did not themselves baptize infants, 
but baptized those persons who were old enough 
to understand about religious things, and to know 
the reason for baptism. But you need not tell the 
priests that nowadays, for it would only make 
them angry.” 

“Does everything that is right make them 
angry, father ? ” I asked. 

My father sighed. 

“I hope that God will enlighten even the 
Roman church, my child,” he answered. “ That 
church was once better than it is now. But I 
fear the eyes of the priests are willfully closed. 
The priests declare the Anabaptists accursed, 
because we reject infant baptism, and are ‘re-bap- 
tized, ’ as the priests say. They have said that for 
hundreds of years, but it is not true. We baptize 
but once. It is their baptism of infants that we 
reject, and the priests know it.” 

And I think it was after this talk with my 
father that, though ignorant of many of the 
proofs of the correctness of the Anabaptist belief 
as drawn from the teaching of the New Testa- 
ment, I felt that I belonged with this perse- 
cuted people, and that I sympathized most heartily 
with the Anabaptists in their struggle for relig- 
ious freedom. I did not realize how much more I 
was to know of that struggle within a few years. 


CHAPTER IX 


FLIGHT 

I T was dark. I half woke. My mother was 
sitting up in bed, and I sleepily wondered 
why. 

I nearly slept again. 

Suddenly there was a great crash, as of falling 
wood. Then a sound of quickly running feet, 
and of voices calling, and of a great deal of wood 
thrown hither and thither. 

My mother sprang up with a half-suppressed cry, 
and ran away from me into the dark. 

I sat up, my heart beating with fright. 

“ Mother ! ” I called. 

I was so frightened that I could hardly speak. 
What was going on outdoors ? 

“ Mother ! mother ! ” I repeated. 

I jumped to my feet, and ran to the outer door 
of the house. It was open. I caught hold of it, 
and trembling, peered outdoors. There was a 
very faint star-light. I could hear indistinct 
noises. Somebody ran swiftly by the door in the 
darkness. I heard some one else plunge in 
another direction. It seemed as if the big fagot 
pile had been thrown down. I could not see its 
top against the sky. 


99 


100 


IN editha’s days 


There were no more sounds. 

I waited, and shivered, and cried silently. 

‘‘Oh, father, father!’’ I sobbed quietly to my- 
self. 

Something dreadful must have happened. I 
stepped silently outside. Trembling, I walked 
noiselessly toward the fagot heap till I found my- 
self stumbling over fagots. They were scattered 
far and wide. 

I dared not make a sound. I went back to the 
house, and stood at the door. Where had my 
mother gone? Had the men killed my father? 
Was my mother dead too ? I did not dare to shut 
the door, for it seemed to me that somebody might 
have entered the house while I had walked toward 
the fagot heap. I looked at the dark, back of me 
in the room, and fancied I heard some one move 
in the blackness. 

By-and-by two figures came toward me from 
the outer darkness. I shrank back as the two en- 
tered the room. 

“Editha,” whispered a voice. 

It was my mother. She fastened the door, hur- 
ried me silently into my day clothing, forbade my 
speaking, and then moved about, evidently putting 
some things into a bag. I could feel some one else 
moving about the room. I knew it was my aunt, 
but the two women did not say anything. 

After a while my aunt kissed me, and then my 
mother took my hand and led me outdoors. 

My aunt shut the door behind us, and mother 


FLIGHT 


lOI 


and I set off in the dark, she carrying the bag and 
holding my hand. I did not dare to talk. I could 
only wonder, as we went softly on, where we were 
going. Once we passed over what seemed to be 
a very shallow stream. My mother lifted me 
across, and then we went on as before, only I 
helped her carry the bag. And so we walked a 
long time till we hid near some bushes, and 
mother gave me something to eat out of the bag. 
It was nearly morning. 

“Are we going to walk all day, mother,’’ I 
whispered. 

“No,” she answered. “We will not walk any 
more till night.” 

And when night came again we did walk a 
long way till we came to a thicket and a wall, 
where we hid in the dark. All about us in the 
field was a multitude of white spots, that as sun- 
rise drew near, turned into sheep. There were so 
many sheep, more than I had ever seen before. 
But I was so sleepy and tired that, as I lay with 
my head in my mother’s lap, I saw the sheep less 
and less, and by-and-by not at all, for I slept 
soundly. 

When I awoke, mother was sitting yet, with 
widely open, tired, watchful eyes ; and one of the 
sheep was eating grass not far from us. I watched 
the creature’s movements with great delight till I 
was more awake, and then I remembered about 
father. 

“Where is father, mother?” I asked. 


103 


IN editha’s days 


She looked at me. 

“ Do not talk, Bditha,” she whispered. “ Some 
one might be on the other side of the wall, and 
might hear us.” 

So hushed I tried to keep quiet through the 
morning, though indeed it seemed a long time to 
have to stay in a thicket and not talk. If it had 
not been for the many sheep I do not know how 
I could have passed the time. There was one 
lamb that came near the thicket, and I tried to 
have the creature allow me to pat it, but the lamb 
was as wild as its mother, and would by no means 
trust to my friendship. 

And as I looked at my mother, and found her 
always sitting, white-faced and anxious-eyed, I 
felt more and more worried about father. Why 
did he not come ? I lost interest in the sheep, and 
at last I sat listening as my mother had set me the 
example of doing. It was afternoon when I dared 
again ask mother my early morning question. 

“Mother,” I whispered, noting the drawn look 
of her face and the fear of her manner, “ where is 
father?” 

“ Perhaps we shall know before long,” she an- 
swered, under her breath. 

We stayed there all day. 

Toward evening my mother broke forth in agony. 

“ Oh, Bditha, Bditha ! ” she begged. “ Pray for 
father. He said he would come here if he were 
alive. I prayed to the saints for him all night. 
And we came here and did not find him. I was 


FLIGHT 


103 

SO in hopes he would be here before we came, and 
now all day has gone by, and he is not here. 
Oh, Bditha, do you know how to pray to the Lord 
Christ himself? Did father teach you how? I 
am afraid father would not like to have me pray 
to the saints for him, but I could not help it. Can 
you pray to the Lord Christ, Bditha?” 

My poor mother ! She was sobbing. She sobbed 
so that I could hardly put my childish petition 
into words, as I knelt beside Her in the thicket. 
But she heard some of the words that I said, and 
she sobbed them over and over again, praying the 
Lord to send my father safely to us. And this, I 
think, was the first time my mother ever prayed, 
save to the Virgin and the saints. 

That night my mother gave me something more 
to eat out of the bag, and got some water from a 
brook, and then once more the darkness came, 
and the sheep turned to white spots in the field, 
and I was sleepy, and I prayed the Lord’s Prayer 
in Bnglish, and went to sleep. I half woke once 
in the night, and I heard my mother whisper : 
“ Lord Christ, if thou wilt send my husband back 
to me, I will pray to thee, and not to the saints, 
all the rest of my life.” 

Then I slept more soundly, and heard nothing 
till I woke once more and found my mother sitting 
yet with widely open, tired, watchful eyes, and 
the white spots in the field had all turned to 
sheep again, for the sun was rising. Mother gave 
me some bread, and we sta3'ed still among the 


104 editha’s days 

bushes. Once in a while we heard a sound, and 
mother seemed to hold her breath to listen. Then, 
perhaps the sheep that had made the sound 
would come in sight, and mother would lean back 
farther among the bushes. 

But toward evening we heard a noise the other 
side of the wall. Mother turned very pale. She 
motioned me to be still. 

But a man jumped over the wall, and as I saw 
his face, I sprang up and ran, forgetting all caution 
in my joy. 

‘‘ Oh, father, father ! ’’ I cried. 

He ran toward me and caught me in his arms. 
A moment more, and we were all three hidden 
among the bushes, my mother sobbing, and my 
father’s arms around us both. It seemed as though 
my mother could never stop crying. To think 
that father had escaped the men, after all ! 

“ I had been almost asleep in the hole among 
the fagots,” my father told us, “ when I thought 
I heard a noise of some one coming softly up the 
pile. I thought perhaps it was one of you, though 
why you came I could not tell. I felt that some 
one climbed to the top of the pile, and moved some 
fagots, and I thought I saw a man’s head between 
me and the sky. I felt an arm reach down and 
grasp me, and I sprang up and grappled with the 
man, and we struggled hither and yon, and 
knocked down a great many fagots ; and another 
man came, and I ran, and they after, but in the 
dark I escaped, and I have come a long, rounda- 


FLIGHT 


105 

bout road hither. The worst thing was, I feared 
I should not find you here, I was so long coming, 
and I dreaded lest ill should befall you, or lest you 
should not dare to wait here.” 

And my mother, who had wept through all his 
words, sobbed still as she answered : “ Oh, Ralph, 
Ralph ! We prayed to the Tord Christ for you ! 
Oh, Ralph, I feared you were dead ! ” 

My father wept somewhat himself. Then he 
looked in our bag, and we all ate something, and 
my father repeated some words from the New 
Testament, because it was too dark to see to read 
in the book. I was so glad he had saved the New 
Testament, and not been obliged to leave it behind. 

My father prayed in English, and so did my 
mother and I, and again the sheep turned to white 
spots in the field, and again I slept. But I think 
that this time my mother slept too, for she knew 
that though homeless, we were all together. Her 
greatest anxiety was gone. 

As I was going to sleep, or when I was awake a 
moment in the night, I had a fleeting remem- 
brance of the story that father had told us about 
those Publicans who years ago were thrust out 
into English fields to die of cold and hunger. 
And I remembered that he had said that such 
people were not called Publicans now, but were 
called Anabaptists, and that Neighbor Eld had 
been an Anabaptist, and that he himself was 
one. Supposing we had to die in the fields like 
those Publicans ! 


Io6 IN editha’s days 

“ I do not care,’’ I thought sleepily, as I reached 
out my hand and felt father’s hand lying near me. 
“ I am going to be an Anabaptist too, just like 
father.” 

Then without realizing what such a resolution 
meant, I went to sleep again. 

From wiiat my father and mother whispered to 
each other very early the next morning, when I was 
half awake on my father’s shoulder, I learned that 
my aunt would doubtless be much relieved to 
have such dangerous persons as my father and my 
mother safely away from the village. Sorry as 
my aunt might be for us, we were a constant 
menace to her hold on the favor of the priests and 
to her consequent security. She might go on 
pilgrimages, and might give tithes, but if she con- 
tinually came to see and be friendly with a family 
suspected of heresy, how should she be safe? 
With us away, she could make her peace with the 
priests. She, perhaps, might be able to save a 
little of what we left behind us, and, if a time of 
religious freedom ever came to England, perhaps 
we might go back home. But that would not be 
yet. 

And then I awoke more fully to realize what 
was meant. 

“ Shall I never see Stephen any more ? ” I asked, 
ready to cry at the loss of my daily companion, 
the one with whom I had been brought up, and 
whom I loved as I might have loved a brother. 
“ Shall I never see Stephen again? ” 


FLIGHT 


107 


My father soothed me quietly. 

“I hope you will, Bditha,” he replied ; “but 
not now. ’ ’ 

Before it was quite light my father left us, for 
he was going to try and find a man he knew, 
one who bore on his cheek the branded mark ac- 
corded to him once as a gospeller. The man often 
came this way, my father told us, and could guide 
us, or tell us the way to a certain farmhouse 
where the good man and his wife both read the 
New Testament and believed it so much that they 
would hide us from the priests for a day or two ; 
and then, after that my father thought we must 
try to find our way to the seacoast and out of 
Bngland. 

It was almost night-time again before father 
came back to us. Mother had become quite wor- 
ried lest he had fallen into evil hands after all. 
But he had not, only he had tried to be so cau- 
tious that the errand had taken him a long time. 
He knew the way to the farmhouse now, and 
after dusk we thankfully followed him through 
the fields till we came at last to the home we 
sought, where the goodman and his wife wel- 
comed us most heartily. 

“ God’s people are one family in evil times like 
these,” said the good man’s wife. 

“ I crave shelter but for a few days,” answered 
my father gratefully. “We are going over the 
sea.” 

The next evening a thing came to pass which 


io8 


IN EDITHA’S days 


impressed me very much. The gospeller who had 
directed my father to our place of refuge, came 
himself there, and, when it was nearly dusk, went 
with us to a little stream a short distance from 
the farmhouse. There the gospeller baptized my 
father and my mother, for my mother had en- 
treated that she might also be baptized. 

“ I believe in the lyord Jesus Christ, who has 
forgiven me my sins,’^ she affirmed. 

And truly I think that always after that ago- 
nized night of watching in the thicket beside the 
wall my mother was a changed woman. Never 
again did she seem to doubt or waver, and never 
afterward did she pray to the Virgin or to the 
saints. In the blackness of that night, her soul’s 
eyes had been opened. The gospeller believed 
now that she was a Christian, and he granted her 
wish for baptism. 

I stood with the goodman and his wife on the 
edge of the little stream and saw through the 
shadows the gospeller baptize my father and my 
mother. An awe came over my spirit. I took 
hold of the goodman’s wife’s hand and she 
pressed mine, and we were still. 

The branded-cheeked gospeller came up out of 
the water with my father and my mother. I 
should never forget it, never. 

I was the more impressed by it because my 
father, before I went to sleep that night explained 
to me that while baptism does not save one’s soul, 
still the ordinance is of Christ’s appointing, and 



In Editha's Days. 


The T-wilight Baptism. 


Page 108. 




FUGHT 


109 


each of his followers should go at his command 
down into a burial in the water and rise again to 
a new life. I understood it all very clearly, and 
I also understood my father’s explanation, when 
he told me that I was yet really unbaptized, 
for that was no baptism which the priest had 
given me when I was a baby, since the New Tes- 
tament tells us to believe and be baptized, and I 
could not have believed first, being an infant. 

“ Ah, my child, do you know what it is to be- 
lieve in the Lord Jesus now that you are old 
enough to do so?” asked my father. “Not till 
you do that, Kditha, not till you have peace with 
God through knowing that Jesus has forgiven 
you all your sins, will you be ready to be baptized. 
Do not trust that the water of your infant bap- 
tism can save your soul, Bditha. Had I known 
what I know now, I would not have allowed the 
priest to put you in the water fourteen years ago.” 


CHAPTER X 


SAFETY AND SEPARATION 

I T was two days afterward. My mother put up 
her hand in silent warning. 

Rap ! rap ! rap ! came a tapping at the door. 

My mother and I hid. The goodman’s wife 
kept silence. 

Rap ! rap ! went on the sound persistently, 
again and again. Some one was stepping softly 
outside the door. We were all still. 

“ Oh, let me in ! Eet me in !” softly begged a 
woman’s voice in distressed tones. ‘‘Oh, as you 
love your lives, let me in !” 

My mother started at the first word, and looked 
at the goodman’s wife. 

“ Eet me in ! ” entreated the woman’s voice at 
the door, as though she knew, notwithstanding 
our silence, that we were there within. “Eet 
me in ! Let me in ! ” 

A lad’s voice was added to the woman’s. 

“Let us in, Kditha,” he begged. And my 
mother sprang up, and ran to the door, and flung 
it open, and cast her arms about the woman 
there, and clung to her and the boy, and drew 
them into the room, shutting the door quickly 
after them, 
no 


safety and separation 


III 


Stephen ran straight to me. 

“You must go away from here,” gasped my 
aunt. “Oh, I thought perhaps the priests had 
found you. I have been seeking you two days. 
Oh, if they had found you, I would have been a 
murderer. I told them where you had gone. I 
could not help it. It was at the confession. The 
priest made me tell. I did not know where you 
would go, after you waited under the wall you 
told me you were bound for. But I had to tell 
the priest about the wall, and about your going 
in the night. Oh, sister, forgive me ; I had to 
tell.” 

My aunt had flung herself on her knees beside 
my mother, and was panting out words with 
hurried sobbing. 

“Oh, where is Ralph?” questioned my aunt. 
“The priests may find you any moment. I 
thought I should never find you. I should not, 
but I found a gospeller. I knew he was one by 
the branded cheek, and I threw myself on my 
knees to him, and begged him to tell me if he 
had seen you. Oh, go ! go ! The priests are 
hunting for you. Where is Ralph ? ” 

The goodman’s wife went outdoors to find her 
husband and my father. They were outdoors by 
day, my father keeping hidden, yet both watching 
lest some of the priests’ messengers should come 
stealthily on the house. 

After coming in and talking a little, my father 
decided that in a few hours, when it grew dark, 


1 12 IN KDITHA’S days 

we would go. The goodman’s wife hid us all 
carefully. Her husband went outdoors to look at 
the sheep and to watch for priests’ messengers, 
and his wife began to cook what she had, that we 
might have supper before going and that we 
might have some food to take with us. 

The older ones who lay hidden whispered a 
little, but Stephen and I were bidden not to 
speak. 

My aunt yet condemned herself that she had 
been obliged to tell the priest of the direction in 
which we went. 

“Oh, I could not help it; I could not,” she 
sobbed, addressing my father. “I went to con- 
fession, and the priest would know whether I had 
known all these months that you were in the fagot 
heap. And I had to tell him that I did know ; 
and he asked how I had dared come to confession 
all these months and not tell him of that. He 
was so angry I thought he would kill me or curse 
my soul. He made me tell which way you went. 
And I started that night, and walked and hunted 
day and night since, for I thought — I thought — ” 

My aunt’s voice broke. 

“They cannot find us unless God wills it so,” 
answered my father calmly. “ Peace, woman, 
peace.” 

My aunt wept on. 

“We will guide you back to your way first,” my 
father promised her, “ then we will go ours.” 

“ Your way is mine ! ” almost fiercely returned 


safety and separation 1 13 

my aunt. “I have suffered enough. I could 
have struck myself for a coward that night when 
I let my only sister and her child go away alone 
in the dark. I have always been near my sister, 
and I will be with her wherever you and your 
New Testament and your Anabaptist folly take 
her. I will not go back.’’ 

“The priests will take your possessions and 
ours,” my father would have reminded her, but 
my mother cast her arms about my aunt, and the 
two women wept together. 

And so, Romanists and Anabaptist “heretics” 
together, we five went away through the sheep 
fields that evening, taking with us that which we 
had saved as most necessary. And a strange dif- 
ference there was in our thinking, for my father, 
besides all our food and what wrappings we had, 
carried with him the New Testament. And my 
aunt, besides her other treasures, had her rosary 
and a little bottle of the holy water she had got 
on her pilgrimage to Reading, and in her purse 
she carried a cross of palm made by the priest on 
last Palm Sunday, it having, she believed, the 
power to keep the evil one away from her. I sup- 
pose she thought she was likely to meet him, go- 
ing off as she was with Anabaptists. Moreover, 
among her things my aunt carried her holy can- 
dles, hallowed by prayer and the sprinkling of 
holy water by the priest and afterward given her 
by him. Any Romish person could light such a 
candle in time of thunderstorms and feel safe. 

H 


IN editha’s days 


II4 

Holy candles were also to be lighted when a per- 
son lay dying. And I know not how much more 
such rubbish my aunt carried with her ; for though 
she left home for my mother’s sake, yet she by no 
means gave up her religion, and perhaps she 
thought that the cross of palm and the holy 
candles might even keep harm from such heretics 
as we were. And I myself heard my aunt mutter 
a prayer to St. Leonard to keep us from prison. 

But my aunt did not particularly desire to call 
my father’s attention to what she carried, and I 
think she was afraid I might speak, for before 
starting she greatly bewailed to me that she could 
not have brought with her an earthen pot that 
for years she had used in cooking. 

“ What shall I do when I want to cook in the 
Low Countries you say we are going to? ” she in- 
quired of me. 

But she asked no such questions of my elders, 
and I think she spoke so to me merely because 
she thought that was a question that might turn 
away my observation from the mass of useless 
things she did bring. 

But, poor soul, she could badly be expected to 
drop all her superstitions at once. I did not say 
a word about what she had brought, and I think 
no one but myself saw the contents of her bundle 
before we started. ' 

So we walked softly through the fields, stum- 
bling again and again over some sheep, for there 
were very many of the creatures. My father 


SAFETY AND SEPARATION II5 

thought if we could but follow the river Kennet 
down to where it joins the Thames, and from 
thence go eastward to the coast of the sea in 
Essex or Kent, or perhaps stop at London and 
take voyage from there, we might do best. We 
had but a little store of money among us, yet we 
trusted there might be enough to take us away 
from King Henry’s realm and help us begin life 
in a new country. 

“ We shall reach a better land than England,” 
defiantly declared my aunt, stalking on. “This 
is not a land for honest folk.” 

She seemed to have taken charge of all of us ; 
and indeed she was always a self-reliant woman, 
though perhaps rendeied more so by the number 
of years she had been a widow, her husband hav- 
ing died shortly after Stephen’s birth. 

We had gone on but a little while. The night 
was deepening about us. I looked back and dis- 
cerned the dark form of my aunt. She was stand- 
ing still. Soon she came hastening on behind us 
with long, silent strides. She caught my mother 
by the arm. 

“There are men!” whispered my aunt. “I 
heard one call to another. They are coming be- 
hind us. And one is a monk of Caversham. I 
know his voice.” 

There was no copse in which we might hide. 
The only thing we could do, in all the broad ex- 
panse of those fields, was to drop down among the 
sheep, trusting that the number of them and the 


ii6 


IN editha’s days 


darkness, might hide us, if it were God’s will. We 
could not tell in just which direction our foes might 
come. That they were our foes we did not doubt, 
since the monk of Caversham was among them. 

The sheep were too sleepy to mind our presence 
and betray us by commotion. I dropped down be- 
tween two of the white creatures. In a few min- 
utes we heard the footsteps of the men who walked 
the fields, talking cautiously to one another. I 
too recognized the voice of that monk of Caver- 
sham. Evidently the men had not seen us, for 
they talked of their purpose of finding the man 
at whose house they supposed us to be yet hiding. 
Fierce threats were made of what should be done 
with us, threats of branding, of whipping, of star- 
vation, of burning. I nestled closer to the sleep- 
ing sheep, and a great quaking shook me with 
fear. 

The monk’s voice was very near. He stumbled 
over a sheep, and his outstretched hand almost 
touched my shoulder, as he cried out with ragre at 
his fall. 

“ The heretics shall pay for this,” he muttered, 
smiting the unfortunate sheep. “ I would every 
heretic in England were burned, but I would I 
had the burning of them. I would not burn 
them whole. Not I. May our Eady and St. 
Dominic send me the day when I can burn an 
Anabaptist piecemeal ! ’ ’ 

He had risen and walked a few steps and now 
he stumbled over another sheep. 


safety and separation 1 17 

“ Come ! ” chided another voice, angrily ; ‘‘ you 
have drunk so much you cannot walk. If you 
found an Anabaptist to-night, he could outrun 

}OU.’’ 

They passed on, and their voices died away. 
We hid among the sheep for an hour or more. 
Then we went forward, and journeyed all that 
night, my aunt continually muttering prayers to 
the saints for our safety. 1 doubt not she thought 
that her cross of palm had delivered us from the 
monk. 

This was the nearest approach to capture in all 
our nights of travel before we reached the coast 
of Essex. There we hid and endured much hard- 
ship and peril, till we thought that all our journey 
had been in vain, so did we despair of being able 
to evade the officers and find shipment for 
the Low Countries. But at last we heard of a 
vessel that would wait at a certain point for us, 
and through the kindness of some fisher-folk we 
were conducted one night across the flat Essex 
marshes and taken in a small boat to the vessel. 

Oh, it was blessed to be fully away from Eng- 
land ! And it was blessed at last to draw near 
land again, to reach the Low Countries, and to 
feel ourselves out of King Henry’s realm. We 
would forget past hardships, and try to make a 
new home. So came we to our next place of 
refuge. 

We were not so very far from a village, Schev- 
eningen, about two miles from the Hague, or 


ii8 


IN editha’s days 


s* Gravenhage^ as the Dutch call that city. The 
village Scheveningen is on the downs that spread 
to the North Sea. The downs are composed of 
ranges of hillocks of sand. Gray skies, misty 
horizons, the glimpse of numerous fishermen who 
lived in the village out of sight across the downs, 
flocks of curlews and gulls sweeping at times 
ovehead ; thin, scattered grass, a little broom and 
rosemary, waves that rushed with a prolonged 
lament against the shore, these are among the 
first sights I had in the Low Countries. Some- 
times we went on land, and walked a good way 
toward the village, and saw drawn npon the 
beach the vessels of the herring fishery, each 
boat with its one mast and great, square sail. 

But we ourselves lived out of reach or sight 
of the sea, on a canal that led to the Hague. 
We lived in a treckschuyt^ for we had been so 
blessed as to obtain one of those large boats, an 
old one, no longer used, as the treckschuyten com- 
monly are, in carrying passengers from one place 
to another. Our treckschuyt was made so that it 
was almost filled with a kind of a house, divided 
into two parts. At the prow was an iron bar with 
a ring, meant for the passing through it of a long 
rope, to be fastened at one end near the helm, and 
at the other end attached to a horse on the canal 
bank. But we had no horse, and did not intend 
to journey. My father had managed to obtain 
this shelter for us only because the treckschuyt 
was very old, and the man who had formerly used 


safety and separation 1 19 

it had, after saving diligently, been able to buy 
another one. 

It delighted me to find that instead of living in 
a house, we were going to have our home in this 
large boat. So many people lived in boats, and 
my father said it might be more safe for us to do 
so. Stephen rejoiced, and we learned as fast as 
possible to talk the queer language we heard, in 
order to be able to speak to the neighbors in the 
other boats. 

And I was so glad that I had learned to read. 
I should have felt disgraced if I had not known 
how to read English, since of course I could not 
read Dutch, and all the people, even the poorest 
of the boatmen, were so much better educated 
than the common folk of England. And if I, at 
fourteen, had not been able to read, how shocking 
it would have seemed ! I did not tell people, 
though, that the New Testament had been the 
book in which I learned to read. For father 
thought that even in this land perhaps we would 
do best to be careful what we said to other people. 
And we found that it was indeed so. But we 
talked all we pleased to each other on those days 
when my father, who had a little boat, took us 
with him fishing. There were many fish in the 
Scheveningen district, and I do not remember 
any happier days than those we spent fishing. 
We felt so safe and happy. Father told us that 
in 1416 the first great herring net was made. It 
was made at Hoorn, the ancient capital of North 


120 


IN kditha’s days 


Holland, and my father told Stephen and me 
about the fishing for herring and cod. It was not 
like the old days when I had had to climb stealth- 
ily up the fagot pile to whisper to my father. 

Many a time I looked out on the waters now, 
and sang, and prophesied to myself : “We shall 
never have any more trouble. Our boat is like 
Noah’s ark, that my father has told me about. 
We are safe in this boat from all trouble.” 

Oh, calm, sweet days, spent on the water, free 
from all harm, you were the last, the last dear 
days of home life together ! I did not prize those 
days then as I would have prized them, if I had 
known. What to us were the plots of King Henry 
of England, his stake, the hatred of the priests, 
and the curse of the pope ? We fished and sang. 

The people around us were honest and in- 
dustrious and trustworthy. Everybody worked. 
It seemed good to love and trust everybody, and 
to sing and work in our boat-home. My aunt had 
to listen to the reading of the New Testament. 
But she did not oppose it so strongly as she would 
once have done, and Stephen, convinced of his 
ignorance in the matter of reading, zealously set 
himself to learn his letters, that he might not be 
despised by the people. 

And after I could well understand the language, 
I heard an Anabaptist woman tell my mother the 
story of Felix Maiitz, who had been a great leader 
among the Reformers, and who had preached 
about baptism, wishing that people should be 


safety and separation 12 1 

believers before they were baptized. He preached 
in various parts of Switzerland, and in the fields 
and the woods he explained the word of God to 
the people who came to hear him. The magis- 
trates of Zurich did not like this, and thought 
Mantz a rebel. So toward the end of 1526, he 
was put in prison in the tower of Wellenberg. 

Mantz confessed that he had baptized, contrary 
to the edict, and said that it is right to obey God 
rather than man. And so he was condemned to 
be drowned. 

“ He was taken from the tower of Wellenberg 
to the fish market,” said the woman, “and as he 
went he praised God for allowing him to die for 
the truth. For he said that anabaptism is right, 
and founded on the word of God. Mantz’s 
mother and brother came to him on the way, and 
told him to be firm. And he was. For God gave 
Felix Mantz such grace that when he was bound 
on the hurdle, and the executioner was about to 
throw him into the water, Mantz sung with a loud 
voice, ‘ Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my 
spirit.’ And then the executioner drowned him.” 

My mother sighed. 

“ Do you know,” continued our new friend, “ I 
cannot think how a person can be a real Christian, 
and yet drown another person. Felix Mantz left 
a writing behind him that said, ‘ It is set before 
him who will be an heir with Christ, that he 
must be merciful, even as his Heavenly Father is 
merciful. Christ never accused any one, as the 


122 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


false teachers now do ; whence it appears that they 
have not the love of Christ, nor understand his 
word.’ ” 

But though we heard such tales, yet something 
persuaded us that trouble would not come to us in 
this boat-home. It seemed as though one might 
sail away, and never have anything more to do 
with priest or king, but forget that any such per- 
sons ever tried to bind one’s soul or take one’s 
life. I think that our manner of living so filled 
my father with the joy of freedom that he was at 
first somewhat blind to the real state of things in 
the country. 

Moreover, my father told Stephen and me what 
he had heard happened last year in Switzerland, 
to the images in the churches at Wesen. Some 
deputies there had threatened the people, but the 
young men courageously took the images out of 
the churches, carried the images to an open place 
near a lake, and cried out to them, as if they had 
really been living saints, who could hear and un- 
derstand : “ Look ! this road (that by the lake) 
leads to Coire and to Rome ; that (to the south) to 
Glaris ; this other (to the west) to Schwytz ; and 
the fourth (by the Ammon) to St. Gall. Take 
which you please. But if you do not move off, 
you shall be burnt.” 

The young men then waited a few minutes, to 
give the images a seemingly fair chance perhaps, 
and then threw them into the fire. There was 
quite a stir over this affair. 


safety and separation 123 

I used to wonder if the image of Our I^ady in 
the little town of Caversham, whence we came, 
would ever be thrown into the fire that way. 
I hardly wanted the angel of the spear-head to be 
treated so, though I now knew him to be an im- 
postor. But he had been the friend and wonder 
of Stephen and myself, and while I knew the 
angel was a cheat, yet I had a strange sort of 
affection for him. Perhaps I may as well say 
here, lest I should forget it, as I go on telling my 
story, that in an after year, that one-winged angel 
of the spear-head did come to grief. For when 
the other impostures of the monasteries were being 
discovered in England, about eight years after our 
flight from that country, the one-winged angel was 
condemned, and was sent to London to be exhibited 
there. No one need ever believe in the angel of 
the spear-head any more. He was further dis- 
graced by having had sent away with him “ a 
piece of the halter with which Judas hanged him- 
self.’’ 

As the days of our sojourn in the Low Countries 
went by, and winter came, the canal froze, and 
the skating began, and the sleds and sledges went 
whizzing by our treckschuyt^ and sometimes even 
the boats of the fishing-village of Scheveningen 
went flying past on the ice, with sails all set. We 
would see peasants skating like arrows. Stephen 
and I could not think of attaining such speed and 
skill. We thought this a pleasant home to which 
we had come to live. So we sang and worked and 


124 


IN KDITHA’S DAYS 


were very happy. And yet our peaceful days 
were soon shadowed. Indeed, I do not think my 
father well knew to what a realm we had fled. 
He only knew that England was not large, and 
that on the continent some men found safety from 
the priests and from King Henry’s decrees. But 
I know, for my father told me, that before coming 
to the Netherlands he had never heard of the de- 
cree issued by the Emperor Charles against the 
followers of Martin Euther. This edict, issued in 
1521, said : “ As it appears that the aforesaid 
Martin is not a man, but a devil under the form 
of a man, and clothed in the dress of a priest, the 
better to bring the human race to hell and damna- 
tion, therefore all his disciples and converts are to 
be punished with death and forfeiture of all their 
goods.” 

The provinces, unfortunately, were the private 
property of Charles V., and he could do as he 
pleased. So this bloody edict was of course carried 
out. The first of July, 1523, two Augustine 
monks were burned at Brussels for having believed 
in Lutheranism. These were the first, but they 
were not the last victims in the provinces. 

Charles had another edict published in the 
Netherlands, forbidding all private assemblies for 
devotion ; all reading of the Scriptures ; all dis- 
cussion within one’s own house about faith, the 
sacraments, the authority of the pope, or other 
religious matters. Whoever did any of these 
things should die. And many did suffer at the stake. 


safety and separation 


125 


And, thougli it is going beyond my story at 
present, I may as well say now that the number 
of Netherlanders who were burned, strangled, or 
buried alive, according to the decrees of the Em- 
peror Charles, for the offense of reading the Scrip- 
tures, of looking askance at a graven image, or 
of ridiculing the idea that Christ is actually pre- 
sent in body and blood in the sacrament of the 
Supper, has been thought to be perhaps as high as 
one hundred thousand, and never has been esti- 
mated as less than fifty thousand. 

Had my father realized how bigoted and cruel 
an emperor Charles V. was, I doubt whether we 
would have gone from England to the Eow 
Countries. And yet I do not know where else we 
could have gone. My father grew more troubled 
month by month in our new home. He and my 
mother held long, secret talks, and I, grown 
sharper- witted by the perils we had undergone, 
knew that all was not right. 

Finally, in February, 1531, a short time after 
our arrival, a command went abroad that no Ana- 
baptist preacher should be harbored in the Nether- 
lands. A reward was offered for the capture of 
any such. And, immediately after this, an edict 
was issued declaring that those persons- who had 
been re-baptized (as it was called), should be 
punished with the utmost severity, if they con- 
tinued obstinate. If they recanted, they should 
find mercy. 

This edict revealed to us what our future was 


126 


IN EDITHA’S days 


to be. And there came to us, soon after the edict 
was made known, a piece of news from Friesland 
that made us more certain that danger was upon 
us to no small degree. Friesland, as you know, is 
one of the provinces of Holland, and is on the larger 
sea and the Zuyder-Zee, so being quite near us. 

A man named Sicke Snijder, or Freerks, was 
baptized on confession of his faith after the edict 
was issued. He was taken prisoner, and, after 
suffering much, and not recanting, was sentenced 
by the court of Friesland as follows : “ Sicke 
Freerks, on this 20th of March, 1531, is con- 
demned by the court to be executed with the 
sword, his body shall be laid on the wheel, and 
his head set upon a stake, because he has been re- 
baptized, and perseveres in that baptism.’’ 

So, by the sword, went this Baptist out of this 
life into that which is eternal. It was not min- 
isters alone who were to suffer. If a poor Ana- 
baptist tailor must die for his belief, would not 
many more of us be condemned also ? 

“ To be executed by the sword, to have one’s 
body laid on a wheel, and one’s head set on a 
stake,” I heard my mother say to my father, “it 
is horrible ! ’ ’ 

But my father answered her in the words of the 
New Testament, “ ‘ It is enough for the disciple 
that he be as his master, and the servant as his 
lord.’ ‘ And fear not them which kill the body, 
but are not able to kill the soul. ’ ‘ He that loseth 

his life for my sake shall find it’ ” 


SAFETY AND SEPARATION 127 

Yet my father, with all his faith, did not know 
what important thing the death of the poor Ana- 
baptist tailor was to accomplish. For it was 
through Snyder’s death that that afterward dis- 
tinguished Anabaptist, Menno Simon, was first 
led to more of the truth concerning baptism. For 
Menno Simon himself says : “It now happened 
that I heard from some brethren that a God-fear- 
ing, pious- man, Sicke Snyder by name, had been 
beheaded at lyeeuwarden, because he had renewed 
his baptism. This sounded wonderfully in my 
ears, that any one should speak of another bap- 
tism. I searched the Scriptures with diligence, 
and reflected earnestly upon them, but could find 
no trace of infant baptism.” 

To us it was very evident that, as he hated the 
IvUtherans, so Charles V. hated the Anabaptists. 

And still, living as we were among the boat- 
people, we had for a time no especial trouble. 
Many a poor fleeing Anabaptist preacher did we 
hide in our treckschuyt from the death that awaited 
him on land. And my father sometimes helped 
carry such preachers away in our smaller boat to 
better hiding places. And it was in our boat- 
home that Stephen and I both at last came to 
know the Lord Jesus Christ as our own Saviour, 
who forgave us our sins according to his promise, 
“ Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast 
out.” Oh, if in those comparatively peaceful 
days I had not found the Lord, how should I have 
borne the distress that came soon ? 


128 


IN editha’s days 


One of the hiding Anabaptist preachers, for 
whose apprehension a reward had been offered, 
and whom we were concealing in our treckschuyt^ 
baptized me one winter night, breaking the thin 
ice to do so. My aunt refused to let Stephen be 
baptized, and he was much grieved about it. 
But I think my aunt hoped to win him back to 
saint-worship and to Rome’s power again, and 
planned the next spring to have a boat separate 
from us, and so keep him from my father’s in- 
fluence. 

Most dreadful times came. There was talk of 
the Spanish Inquisition. There had been inquis- 
itors in the Netherlands before. I do not know 
why my father did not flee from the Netherlands. 
I think he thought of doing so. We had been 
now two years there. I was sixteen. My aunt 
had accomplished her design, and was now living 
1532 with Stephen in another boat, not a treck- 
schuyt like ours, but of good size. 

One day, toward evening, some men came down 
upon us so suddenly that it confuses me now 
when I think of it. We — my father, my mother, 
and I — were hurried away as prisoners, charged 
with having harbored Anabaptist preachers, and 
with being Anabaptists ourselves. On shore my 
father and my mother were hastened in one direc- 
tion, I was taken in another. I never saw them 
again. I do not know what became of them. I 
can guess, but the thought is too horrible. 

When we were surprised by our captors the 


safe:ty and separation 129 

Kiiglish New Testament was hidden on board oiir 
boat. None of us had time to take the book, and 
I comforted myself afterward for its loss by think- 
ing that perhaps Stephen and my aunt might 
come in their boat, and discover what had been 
done with us, and look in the usual hiding-place 
for the New Testament, and finding, read it. 
My aunt’s boat had been out of sight at the time 
of our capture. It would be a great shock to my 
aunt to find out what had occurred. ButJ thought 
neither of the New Testament nor of my aunt at 
the moment of separation. 

I caught one last glimpse of my mother’s face 
as the men hastened her away. I would not say 
to myself that it was the last look. I yet had 
hope that we might in some way escape. I had 
supposed that as a matter of course we three would 
be kept together, would share one another’s 
troubles, would perhaps be put to death together. 

I thought it would be sweet to enter heaven 
together. 

But when, immediately after reaching the shore, 
the men had separated us, I cried out in alarm, 
and my mother succeeded in turning her head and 
giving me that last look. Ah, mother-face, never 
again, never again to be seen on earth !' My father 
was already so hurried ahead that he could give 
me neither word nor look. 

Ah, it will not matter, when I enter heaven, 
when I see waiting there the two dear home-faces, 
when I hear them cry, “My child,” when I feel 
I 


130 IN EDITH A’S days 

my father’s and my mother’s arms around me 
once again, it will not matter then that we were 
so cruelly torn apart. There we can talk peace- 
fully of the past. 

But at the time of our sudden separation, I was 
overwhelmed, and I wept so bitterly that I did 
not notice at all which way I was taken. I knew 
it was to some building where I was put into a 
very small room, and then I threw myself down 
and for a long time sobbed out my heart-break. 

In the midst of my weeping, however, the door 
opened again, and another girl was pushed into 
the cell. A little food was given us, but neither 
she nor I could eat. 

Sitting in darkness that did not allow us to see 
one another’s face, we both sobbed for a time. 
She told me that her name was Thyra, and that 
she also was the daughter of Anabaptists. I had 
never seen nor known of her in the past. 

It was not till the night was perhaps half gone 
that sleep came to still my tears and calm my 
aching head. I suppose that it was morning when 
I woke, judging from the length of dim daylight 
that followed. I had slept heavily from grief and 
exhaustion. I could see that Thyra, who I thought 
was a girl two or three years younger than I, was 
awake. She did not look as if she had slept at all. 
She was sitting, gazing forward intently. There 
was something in her appearance that startled me 
a little at first, but I did not speak to her. I was 
thinking how much good Anabaptists had done in 


safety and separation 


the Netherlands in the past ; how many they had 
drawn from the Romish church ; how many they 
had taught to believe in the true way of salva- 
tion. 

‘ ‘ And now the Emperor Charles will kill every 
Anabaptist he can find,” I thought. “ No wonder 
so devout a Romanist as he, thinks that we are 
worthy of death.” 

I felt a great longing to know what had become 
of my father and my mother. Oh, should I never 
see them again ? I buried my face and sobbed 
till I could sob no more. x\nd my poor room- 
mate. Did she also grieve over her loved ones ? 

I looked steadfastly at Thyra. But her gaze was 
far enough away. 

Suddenly a great shudder shook her, and she 
turned wild eyes upon me. 

“ Is it once, or is it twice ? ” she screamed. “ Is 
it once, or is it twice ? Oh ! ’’ 

She covered her ears with her hands, and shud- 
dered. 

“ Thyra ! Thyra ! What is it ? ” I cried, striv- 
ing to soothe her. 

But she, still shuddering with what seemed to 
be horror, put me away. Her light hair fell from 
its fastening, and she caught at the locks and 
pressed them to her ears as if to shut out some 
awful sound. Then a seeming madness fell upon 
her, and she rushed at the walls, striking them as 
if she would push them over. Unheeding the 
bruised palms of her feeble hands, she struck un- 


IN editha’s days 


133 

ceasiligly till I caught and held and tried to calm 
her. And then she broke out in wild weeping. 

All that day she seemed in a kind of maze, and 
I, watching her, feared lest our imprisonment was 
beginning to affect her mind. Sometimes she 
slept, but ever and anon she would spring half-up 
and look at me with a face so horror-struck that I 
felt a chill go over me. 

When night came, I was very hungry, and I 
was sure Thyra must be too, though some horror 
held her mind fast and would not let it go, where- 
fore it might be that she did not feel her hunger 
keenly. We had eaten the very small amount of 
food given us the night before. 

I lay down and slept at last. But I woke in the 
depths of the night. Thyra was asleep. Through 
the prison walls I had heard some sounds that* had 
waked me. They came again, dreadful, choking 
sounds, and then one voice after another cried, 
tauntingly, “ Is it once, or is it twice ? Is it once, 
or is it twice ? ” 

I thought I dreamed at first. They were the 
same words that Thyra had screamed. 

But I could not mistake. Through the wall 
came a faint sound as of some one trying to speak, 
and then men’s voices cried again : “ Is it once, 
or twice? Re-bap tizer, is it once, or twice?” 

Then there was a rush, as of men who set upon 
a prisoner and choked him. There were a few 
gasping sounds, dreadful, horrible, so that I shut 
my ears and lay shaking with terror. 


safety and separation 133 

“ Re-baptizer. ” I had heard the word. I was 
sure I had. Now I knew what that question 
meant : “ Is it once, or twice? ” 

“ To baptize again.” For that is what the name 
Anabaptist means, and the German word “ Wied- 
ertdufen,'''‘ It was an unjust name to give us, since 
of course we did not immerse any one twice, but 
only once, not recognizing the baptism of the 
church of Rome as the true baptism taught by 
our Lord Jesus Christ in the New Testament. 

Oh, that horrible, horrible night. It seemed 
as though a number of men were torturing the 
prisoner by taking turns in choking him, allowing 
him time to recover between each onslaught. 
There came a series of dreadful, gasping, strang- 
ling sounds that I shuddered to hear, and yet 
listened to, being held by horror. The Anabaptist 
was gaining his breath. 

‘‘ Let him have a little more breath, just a little 
more,” sneered one voice, “and we will try it 
again.” 

“Now! Now! Another chance. Another!” 
cried one, with the enjoyment of a fiend in 
it. “ Re-baptizer, is it once, or is it twice? Once 
or twice ? ’ ’ 

A shriek pierced the walls. I sprang up, shaking 
so that I could hardly stand. How could Thyra 
sleep? The cold sweat stood on my face. I shut 
my ears and sprang from that side of the cell to 
the other. Oh, horror, horror ! What awful deed 
was this ? I crouched in the far corner of my cell, 


134 


IN editha’s days 


my ears tightly shut, my head against the wall, 
that last scream ringing through my brain, and I 
prayed that deafness might fall upon me. For so 
wrought was I that it seemed as if those heart- 
chilling sounds pierced through the walls and 
through my hard- pressing fingers into my very 
brain in spite of my effort. 

It appeared to me that hours went by, but it 
was thick blackness yet when at last I ventured 
to remove my hands from my ears and listen. I 
heard nothing. Numb from my long kneeling, 
trembling with cold, I crept back beside Thyra, 
and lay down. My widely open eyes stared at 
the dark. What form of ghastliness might lie on 
the other side the wall ? Echoes of those outcries 
seemed to come through the death-like blackness, 
yet I knew they were the phantasms of sounds and 
not real repetitions. 

At last morning appeared, or such faint rays of 
it as could penetrate our prison. Thyra woke, 
and the long sleep seemed to have restored her, 
for she spoke rationally enough, though I could 
hardly answer her, I was so overcome by the 
horrors of the night. I wondered that she could 
have been so exhausted as to have slept, and heard 
nothing. But I would not tell her what I had 
heard. 

During that day Thyra told me something that 
made me at first think that her mind wandered 
again, for I could not deem her tale credible. 
She told me that the Swiss Reformer, Ulrich 


SAFETY AND SEPARATION 135 

Zwiugli, who introduced the Reformation into 
Zurich, and who did so much against the church 
of Rome, had dreadfully persecuted some Ana- 
baptists. It seemed as if persons who had known 
how wickedly the church of Rome persecuted 
those good people called “heretics,” would 
hardly try to turn persecutors themselves, just 
after having obtained their own religious freedom, 
but Thyra said it was so. And, alas, I fear she 
spoke truly! We poor Anabaptists have been 
persecuted by Romanists and anti-Romanists also. 
Neither would let us have religious freedom. 

“ Zwiugli and his followers went so far at one 
time that they threw about twenty Anabaptists, 
men and women and children, into a dark, 
miserable tower,” Thyra told me, “and pro- 
nounced sentence upon them that they should 
never see either sun or moon for the remainder of 
life, and should be fed till death on bread and 
water. And, to make the sentence more terrible 
it was decreed that the prisoners should stay in 
the dark tower together, both the, living and the 
dead, surrounded with filth and petrefaction, until 
not a single one of these Anabaptists should re- 
main alive.” 

“Oh, Thyra I ” I exclaimed ; “ Christians could 
not do such things to one another 1 That is the 
way the priests and friars act to the I^ollards and 
the gospellers ! It must be it was the church of 
Rome that treated those Anabaptists so.” 

“No,” persisted Thyra, “it was the Reformer 


IN editha’s days 


13^ 

Zwingli and his followers ! Why, yon have heard 
of that famous Anabaptist, Balthasar Hiibmaier, 
who went to the stake a few years ago (1528), and 
whose wife they drowned in the river Danube? ” 
“Yes, surely,” I answered. 

“ He said that those Anabaptists were treated 
so by Zwingli and his followers,” continued Thyra. 
“ And Balthasar Hiibmaier said too that some of 
"those Anabaptists in that dreadful tower would 
refuse to take even a mouthful of bread, and 
would not eat for three days in succession, that 
the other persons might have more to eat. And 
it was all because they were Anabaptists ! Pious 
Christian people, of whom no one could speak any 
evil, except . to say that they had received bap- 
tism ! ’ ’ 

Thyra began to tell me that Zwingli knew well 
what the Anabaptists believe. At least he knew, 
she said, of their faith being that infants are un- 
able to repent or to trust in Christ for salvation, 
and therefore should not receive baptism, that 
ordinance being for those who believe that 
through Christ their sins are blotted out. But 
another thought seemed to strike Thyra, and she 
began to tell me how the Anabaptist Balthasar 
Hiibmaier himself had been put to the torture, 
but I turned faint and conld not hear the story. 

“ Thyra,” I begged, “ stop ! ” 

She said no more, and I lay till the wretchedly 
faint feeling left me. Then I sat up and leaned 
against the wall. By-and-by I rose and walked 


safety and separation 137 

around the little cell. I had thought of some- 
thing. How was it that those sounds had come 
so distinctly through the wall the night before ? 
I had heard the man’s choking and gasping, his 
pitiable appeals for mercy, his strangled return to 
breath, almost as clearly as if he had been in the 
same cell that we occupied. Could such a thing 
be, if the walls were as thick as they seemed ? 

“There is a loose stone somewhere, or some 
hole that leads into that room,” I assured myself. 
“ I will find out what it is.” 

Thyra watched me as I carefully felt the walls. 

“Why do you do it ? ” she asked ; but I dared 
not refer her mind to those sounds. 

I felt over those walls all day. The occupation 
served to keep me from thinking how hungry I 
was. I almost despaired sometimes as I felt of 
the stones , but I prayed God to guide my fingers, 
and I hunted on. 

It was toward evening, when down near the 
floor, feeling a large stone, I thought it moved 
slightly. I tried again. I was sure it shook. 

“ Thyra ! ” I said softly ; “ Thyra ! ” 

She turned her head. 

“ Come and help me,” I whispered. She came, 
wondering, but when she felt the stone move, she 
was as eager as I. 

We tugged at the stone together or singly, as 
our breath held out. Gradually we pulled it out 
farther into our cell. When the stone was drawn 
so that it proj,‘.cted into our prison, and was top- 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


^38 

pling, Thyra and I both sat down on the floor 
and rested a few minutes to get breath. Bnt the 
light of hope was in our faces. We smiled at 
each other, and it seemed strange to smile, so little 
cause had we had for doing so in recent days. 
One more pull and the stone would be out. 

“The stone above this one is loose,’’ mur- 
mured Thyra, with her hand upon the wall. 

“We must not let that stone fall when we draw 
the lower one out,” I warned. “ Tet us see if we 
can pull the upper one out first.” 

But we could not. The upper stone even held 
its place after we had dragged the lower entirely 
out, so wedged in was the block. 

“There is a passage,” I whispered, seeing amid 
the dust and darkness what the removal of the 
lower stone had revealed. “ Oh, will this stone 
never move? Do not make a noise !” 

We could not help it. The second stone we 
strove with was loosened now, and fell, notwith- 
standing all our efibrts. The noise of its fall 
echoed in our ears, and we held our breath and 
looked at one another, waiting for discovery. 

But no one came. Thyra and I, at last, with 
much exertion pulled the second stone from our 
way, and a narrow passage lay before us through 
the wall. The passage led to darkness as far as 
we could see, but I believed it would open into 
that cell where last night’s horror had been en- 
acted. 

I drew a long breath. 


SAFETY AND SEPARATION 


139 


‘‘ Come,” I whispered to Thyra. 

An instant more, and I was crawling through 
the narrow passage. 

We had not gone more than a little way when 
I struck my forehead against something that was 
so cold it sent a chill through me. Yet I per- 
ceived immediately that what I had touched was 
nothing I need fear, being merely apiece of grating 
through which I could now see that there was a cell 
beyond. I feared lest the grating should prove so 
strong as to resist me and prevent us from doing 
anything else but to go back to our prison. But 
I laid hold of the grating, and it proved very old 
and feeble, for it bent readly before my pressure, 
and it was but a little while till I had broken 
and bent aside the obstruction. 

Through this old grating I had not been able 
to see much of the interior of the cell, for such 
was the angle of the little passage in which I had 
crept that I could view but a small portion of the 
cell’s floor. And my next thought, after going 
through the broken old grating myself, and once 
standing upright in this other cell, was to help 
Thyra out through the opening. So I did not 
look around till we were both in the little room. 

Then Thyra half cried out in alarm, and the 
same instant I saw what caused her cry. 

“ It is the re-baptizer ! ” I gasped. 

The faint light showed the motionless form of 
a man seated on the floor and leaning against the 
wall. His open eyes stared with the wide gaze 


140 


IN editha’s days 


of the dead. His tongue protruded a little from 
his mouth. There were purple marks all over his 
throat, and noticeably was there a deep blotch be- 
neath his chin. 

Thyra’s eyes followed the gaze of the dead 
Anabaptist, upward, past us. 

“ He looks toward the only land where there is 
religious freedom,” she whispered. 

There was an awfulness in the rigid, bruised 
form before us. I felt a chill of fear go over me 
as I looked at those fixed eyes appealing upward 
to God. I heard those fiendish voices sounding 
again in my ears the malignant words : “ Is it 
once, or is it twice ? Re-baptizer, is it once or is it 
twice? ” 

Thyra laid her hands softly on the dead man’s 
eyes, and sought to close them, but she could not. 
He looked on through her fingers, looked on after 
she had taken away her hand. And I thought 
of the multitude of such martyrs whose dead eyes 
also looked up to God, and whose dead lips 
were set in silent appeal to him to send relig- 
ious freedom to his people. Was not this dead 
man before me one of God’s agents in securing 
that religious liberty which my father had often 
said he believed would come sometime. 

“Sometime, Editha, sometime, men will be 
free to worship God, free to read the New Testa- 
ment, without being sent to the stake.” 

In sight of that man who had given up his 
life rather than his right to believe and prac- 


safety and separation 141 

tise wliat God’s word says, I suddenly felt as I 
had never felt before, what the work of the Ana- 
baptist is. It is to aid the coming of equal relig- 
ious liberty to all. For I felt sure that if this 
Christian had been in the place of his enemies, 
in power instead of captivity, he would not have 
attempted to compel them by bodily attack, by 
the cruelty of smiting and choking, or by threat 
of the stake, to turn them to his belief. Rather, he 
would have given them the New Testament, and 
asked them to search for themselves and see if 
what he believed was not the command of our 
lyord. 

“ Freedom ! Freedom ! That is what we want ! ” 
my father had cried. “ Freedom of soul for every 
man. Why should a king or priest try to bind 
any man’s soul ? What right has one man to for- 
bid another man to worship God in liberty ? ” 

And this had been the cry of every Anabaptist 
I had ever known. Would the Anabaptists ever 
succeed in gaining what they were struggling and 
praying and dying to obtain ? The God of 
martyrs knew. Barth looked dark enough. 

The thin, bruised face, the rigid form, the 
dreadfully appealing gaze of the dead Anabap- 
tist’s eyes, held Thyra and me awe-bound for a 
few moments, forgetful of our own danger in be- 
ing where we were. 

“Thyra, Thyra!” I whispered, my eyes on 
the purple blotches of that throat; “no Anabap- 
tist ever treated another person in that way.” 


142 


IN editha’s days 


She shuddered, and stooping, touched the dead 
man’s wrist ; it was pulseless. 

“ He is dead ! He is dead ! ” she said, shivering. 
“ Let us go away.” 

Where could we go ? We tried the door ; it was 
fast. We might as well have stayed in our own 
cell, as far as escape was concerned. We waited, 
and it grew darker, darker. I could not keep my 
eyes from the face of the dead man, showing a 
faintly lighter thing through the gloom. By-and- 
by the cell was darker still, but I could not help 
fancying that I saw the dead martyr’s eyes look- 
ing yet upward with their awful appeal. 


CHAPTER XI 


ESCAPE 

T ISTEN!” whispered Thyra, grasping my 

-L' arm in the dark of the night. 

I had already heard. A slow, shuffling foot 
walked outside the cell. The sound stopped at the 
door. Thyra and I hastily stepped to a spot where 
we thought we would be behind the door when it 
swung open inward. This was the only protection 
we might have from discovery. We had no time 
to creep back into the passage between the two 
cells. 

After a sound of fumbling at the fastenings, 
the door swung upon us. A little light from a 
small lamp showed faint rays in the dark, and an 
ugly-looking old man shuffled in. The door and 
the dimness of the light served to conceal us, 
though we shook at near discovery, as the bent, 
stupid-appearing visitor slowly crossed the room to 
the body of the Anabaptist. 

The old ift^n bent farther down with his back 
toward us. He was trying to unfasten the chain 
that bound the victim to the wall. 

Thyra pulled at my hand, and silently glided 
from behind the door. She did not make a sound 
in the semi-darkness. The door was wide open. 

143 


144 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


I could not hear the faintest noise to indicate 
when Thyra passed over the threshold and into 
the corridor. 

The old man rattled the chain, and made impa- 
tient mutterings and deep guttural noises, as he 
tried to unfasten the body that he had come to 
bear away. 

Could I glide out as silently as Thyra had done ? 
I drew a long breath and stealthily, with heavily 
beating heart, came on tiptoe from behind the 
door. Slowly and softly I moved toward the 
opening. Once let me make a sound, and what 
might not follow ? 

The old man had succeeded in unfastening the 
chain, and it fell with a loud rattle. Amid the 
noise I sped out of the door, caught Thyra’s hand, 
and together we hurried through the dark, anywhere 
— ^any where to escape ! We stopped after a while, 
for we dare not run whither we knew not. But we 
heard groans from what seemed to be another cell, 
and we hastened out of hearing. Soon we saw 
behind us the glimmer of a light, and the form 
of the old man, bending beneath the dead that he 
bore. He turned in another direction, and we 
were left in darkness again. 

Now we knew not whether to congratulate our- 
selves that we had escaped from the cell, or not, 
save that we were glad to be free to move farther. 
For we could not tell where we were, or what was 
the way out of this prison, and we dared not whis- 
per to each other, lest some hand should suddenly 


ESCAPE 


145 


reacli out of the dark and seize us. I was con- 
vinced that no one had gone to our cell to take 
cognizance of our absence, or to leave food there, 
or to threaten us with torture. I believed that 
our captors meant to starve us. And I wondered 
what had become of my father and my mother. 
Were they in some such prison as this? 

Thyra and I felt softly along the walls, carefully 
feeling with our feet also, before taking a step. It 
was well we did so, for once when I put out my 
foot I could find no place to set it down. 

Startled, I drew back, crouched on my knees, 
and felt before me with my hands. In front of 
me there seemed to be a kind of opening in the 
stone floor. After feeling awhile, I found that 
instead of the pit into which I had supposed I 
had been about to fall, this was a stairway that 
descended somewhere. I drew Thyra to me, 
and putting my mouth to her ear, whispered as 
softly as I could the fact of my discovery. She 
felt the stairway also, and we began to creep 
softly and cautiously down. For anything that 
we knew the stairway might be as safe for us as 
the corridor through which we had come. Bvery- 
thing was blackness. 

We proceeded downward for perhaps thirty steps. 
Then this passage seemed to open into another 
one. We walked a distance, and suddenly we 
found ourselves in a room where a small lamp, 
placed on the floor, shone feebly on the face and 
tonsured head of a priest. 

K 


T46 


IN EDITHA’S days 


A tlirill of fear ran over me, and then I saw 
that the face was that of a dying priest, of one so 
near death that he might do us no harm. His 
eyes observed us, and he seemed afraid. He 
slirank from us, and in a whisper begged us not 
to trouble him. It was not until I answered, that 
he seemed to realize that we were indeed human. 
I think, from what he afterward said, that he had 
thought we were some of his murdered victims. 

But when he knew we were human, he caught 
at me with his thin, nerveless fingers, and be- 
sought us, for the love of God and Our kady, to 
listen. 

“ I hear it ! I hear it ! ” His faint voice rose 
into what was the shriek of a whisper. “I hear 
it night and day. Water — dripping, dripping ! ” 

There was a cup of water beside him, and think- 
ing he was thirsty, I offered it to him. But the 
dying man put it away with warding hands and a 
gesture of horror. 

“ I hear,” he whispered, and his whisper had an 
awful alarm in it ; “I hear the water dripping — 
dripping — dripping ! ” 

A cold sweat stood on his face. He began rap- 
idly, in that gasping whisper, to pour forth a con- 
fession, and afraid as we were that we might be 
discovered, we could not leave a dying man in 
such agony of soul as seemed to torment this 
priest. 

Gradually, from his agonized whispers, I came 
to understand that he had been long a priest. 


ESCAPE 


147 


sometimes in Spain, sometimes in England, of 
late years in the Low Countries. The tonsure of 
his head was large, indicating that he had been 
of rank in the church. But though the tonsure 
is said to represent the crown of thorns worn by 
Christ, I fear this priest had had little of the spirit 
of our Lord. 

Now that he was dying, there was one crime 
which haunted him more than all else beside. He 
had helped for a time in Spain the work of the 
Inquisition. He had been stationed at Valladolid 
and elsewhere. 

One dreaded torment to which the Inquisition 
sometimes put its victims was, this priest whis- 
pered, the binding of a person, placing him in a 
“groove,” the feet being higher than the head. 
A wet, fine linen cloth was then put into the 
victim’s mouth, and an earthen vessel was held 
above his face so that from a hole in the 
bottom of the vessel water little by little fell 
continuously, yet so slowly that it required an 
hour for a pint to thus drip away. The water fell 
on the nostrils and the mouth of the victim, who 
found it impossible to breathe, the wet linen cloth 
and the unnatural position combining to increase 
the difficulty. The result often was the rupture 
of some blood-vessel in the lungs of the person so 
tortured. 

It seems that the priest, who was in gasping 
whispers telling us this tale, had often held the 
earthen vessel over the mouths and nostrils of the 


IN kditha’s days 


148 

condemned, and deliberately kept the water drip- 
ping, suffocating the victims. There was one 
man particularly, who haunted the priest now, 
one whom the priest insisted he now saw at 
nights, lying in the groove. 

‘‘I can hear the water dripping, dripping, oh, 
so softly dripping,” he asserted. “Do you not 
hear it? There! it drips, it drips.” 

A dreadful shuddering shook him, but Thyra 
and I heard nothing like the sound which terrified 
his innermost soul. 

As he had told his tale, however, I had remem- 
bered him. There had been something that I re- 
called about his face from the first instant. I 
knew now who he was. I was sure I knew. 
He had said that he was once a priest in Eng- 
land. 

He was none other than that stranger priest 
who, six years before, when I had been a little 
girl of ten, had accosted Stephen and me at Caver- 
sham and asked us if we knew where John Bid 
lived. This was the priest I had watched through 
the crevice in Neighbor Eld’s hut stirring the 
straw of the bed, striking here and there in the 
corners of the hut, trying to find something. Woe 
would have been to Neighbor Eld that day if this 
man had found him. 

Why was this priest left to die alone? Where 
were the other priests who should now attend this 
dying member of their order? Where was the 
pyx, the viaticum for the dying? Where were 


ESCAPE 149 

the holy candles which should have been burning 
about him? 

“ I hear,” gasped once more the dying man, in 
a whisper shriller than before, “ I hear the drip- 
ping.” 

Thyra bent toward him. 

“ Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou 
shalt be saved,” she whispered. ‘‘Oh, cry the 
prayer of the penitent thief who was saved on the 
cross, ‘ Lord, remember me ! ’ ” 

But the priest heeded not. He had raised his 
tonsured head with the strength of the dying. A 
hideous fear was in his face. 

“ I hear ” he whispered with labored breath, 

“I hear — the dripping — of water.” 

An infinite horror was looking out of his eyes. 

He fell back. There was twice a twitching of 
his mouth dreadful to see. There was a choking 
sound in his throat. 

Thyra caught my hand. The priest had gone 
to the judgment of God. 

Thyra and I stood speechless ; then, still clasp- 
ing hands, terror-stricken, we remembered our- 
selves and where we were. I pointed toward a 
door opposite the opening where we had entered 
the room. Thyra and I silently reached the door 
and tried it. It was fastened, but we succeeded in 
unfastening it, not knowing what would meet us 
on the other side. The door opened, grating a 
little, and we hastily stepped through and shut it. 

A cool wind struck my face. I could hardly 


150 IN editha’s days 

believe it. We stood in an archway outside the 
building. 

It was night. The archway was blackness, but 
leading up before us were a few steps, and far 
above them I saw the sky. Thyra and I forgot 
all caution and ran up the steps. We fled as if 
for our lives. It seemed as though the face of the 
dead priest followed us. I ran faster at the 
thought, and faster still we sped when we remem- 
bered that we had left the door unfastened and we 
might have been heard and pursued. But I re- 
flected that the discovery of the death of the 
priest would probably so excite the discoverer 
that he would not think to try the door to see if it 
was fastened. 

At length we stopped in a spot beside some 
water. Thyra bent and drank greedily. 

I am so thirsty,’’ she whispered. 

We were hungry and thirsty both. I was 
almost faint for lack of food. We drank and 
drank of the water for which our parched mouths 
had so longed, and I thought of those who had been 
perhaps our fellow-prisoners, who were now lan- 
guishing for water and were unable to get it. It 
seemed almost heartless for us to sit there in the 
darkness, drinking, washing our dusty faces, and 
wetting our aching heads. But discovery and re- 
imprisonment might come with morning. Now, 
at least, we were free and we had water. And 
yet I could hardly bear to touch the water when I 
remembered the priest’s dying words. 


ESCAPE 151 

“ I wonder where we shall find something to 
eat?” whispered Thyra. 

I thought, but did not say, that perhaps we 
would be recaptured before morning, and would 
be spared all further anxiety as to our eating. 

Evidently some such thought passed through 
Thyra’ s mind too, for she whispered softly : “ Did 
you hear about that Anabaptist girl here in the 
Hague, five years ago? She was the daughter 
of Weynken Claes, of Monickendam, and she was 
strangled and burnt. 

“ And this year,” went on Thyra, finding that 
I did not answer, “nine Anabaptist citizens of 
Amsterdam were martyred here in the Hague. 
Yes, and Kraen of Harzenswovde and his wife, 
and two other Anabaptists were put to death at 
Haarlem, where Jan Walen and two companions 
were strangled and burnt, I believe, as that girl 
was I told you about, the daughter of Weynken 
Claes.” 

“Thyra,” I answered in a whisper, “do not 
talk. I am afraid some one will hear.” 

But she was too much agitated to be quiet. 

“I cannot understand it,” she whispered on. 
“The Anabaptists are always persecuted, always. 
Whoever writes the history of the Anabaptists 
will write it in blood and tears. Why is it that 
we are persecuted above all other people?” 

Now I remembered that once when my aunt 
had been speaking to my father, during the time 
that we two families had lived in the same boat, 


IN EDITHA’S days 


152 

she having in spite of her prejudice observed the 
good character of the Anabaptists, had asked him 
this self-same question. 

“But why,” my aunt had persisted, “why do 
they suffer so? I cannot understand it.” 

My father drew a quick breath, and his cheeks 
flushed. 

“ I can tell you,” he answered. “ It is because 
we hold the truth.” 

“Other sects claim the same for themselves,” 
objected my aunt. 

“ But none hold it as we,” asserted my father, 
his eagerness flashing forth in his face. “ None 
as we. We take our baptism from the plain word 
of the New Testament, not from any word of 
priest, or pope, or council. Search and look if it 
is not so. Search and look if the New Testament 
says not that one must repent and be baptized. 
Can a babe repent? Then wherefore should it 
be baptized ? Search and look if the New Testa- 
ment says not that our Lord came up out of 
the water after his baptism, and that we are buried 
with him in baptism. Is sprinkling a burial? 
Do you not know that we Anabaptists have more 
of the truth than others, because we hold more 
closely the New Testament? That is the reason 
we are so persecuted. Yea, but our persecutions 
will work out the religious freedom of ourselves 
and all other men. So I hope and believe.” 

It was this that I remembered, and told Thyra, 
and she grew glad in the thought 


ESCAPE 


153 


“ Oh,” she said, “ if one could but think that ! 
If one could be sure that all this a^ony would 
end at last in religious freedom for all men, then 
how happy we might be that the Lord has 
accounted us worthy to suffer most, not only for 
his sake, but for the sake of human beings.” 

“Will not God hear his people ? ” I whispered. 
“ Surely all their prayers for religious freedom 
will not be in vain.” 

I could not think what Thyra and I would 
better do. Perhaps we could find our way back 
to the treckschuyt where my father, my mother, 
and I had been surprised and taken. It seemed a 
dangerous way to go, but I felt a sudden hope, 
and my heart beat quickly at the thought that 
possibly my father and my mother might have 
escaped in some way from their captors, and 
might have gone back to the treckschuyt^ and 
be waiting and hungering for my coming. I half 
persuaded myself that it might be so. In a quiver 
of excitement I told Thyra what I thought, and 
asked her if she dared go with me, or if she 
thought our enemies would find us there. 

She was very doubtful what to say. Finally, 
we left the place where we had been hiding, and 
went silently down a street. How should we 
know where we were ? We came upon a little, 
low, black tower, hanging apparently over the 
waters of a marsh. What was this place ? We 
turned and passed down another stieet. We dis- 
turbed a stork, and were afraid of the conse- 


154 


IN KDITHA’S days 


queiices, but the bird merely moved a little. We 
wandered on, we knew not where, and came upon 
a scaffold. Shuddering at what it implied, we 
hurried away. The hours of darkness were going 
by. What should we do if morning came with- 
out our escaping from the city ? 

We found a canal and followed it fora distance. 
A saltness began to be felt faintly in the air. We 
must be going in the right direction, for that odor 
came from the sea. It was in that direction on 
the canal that the treckschuyt lay, or had lain. 
Thyra and I crept under a gate, and hurried fur- 
ther down the canal. By-and-by, when we had 
walked awhile, I became sure of our direction. 
I had seen this way before. 

“ Come,” I hastened Thyra. 

We ran. 

There at last, through the trees that bordered 
the canal, v/e saw the black outline of the old 
treckschuyt^ moored still close to the side of the 
canal path. Thyra and I softly rushed toward the 
boat. We clambered on board with caution, 
being mindful of the fact that some of our ene- 
mies might have taken possession. Morning was 
coming, and we must have some place to hide. 

Softly we looked into the compartment of the 
treckschuyt next the prow. I was trembling with 
excitement. What if in one of these compart- 
ments I should find the two over whose unknown 
fate I had spent such hours of agonizing specula- 
tion, my father and my mother ? 


ESCAPE 


155 


But by tbe dim light everything seemed to be 
in the same semi-confusion in which we had left 
the boat. Things remained where they had been 
dropped. This sent all hope from me. I burst 
into tears. Thyra sympathizingly suggested that 
we look into the other compartment. 

“ Do not give up hope, Kditha, ” she whispered, 
her arms around me. “They may be safe, even 
if they are not here.” 

But, though I followed Thyra, I could not keep 
from tears. The other compartment we found to 
be in order. Nothing had been touched. Here 
was where we had hidden the copy of the New 
Testament. I uncovered the hiding-place, and at 
the sight of the treasured book that had accom- 
panied us through so many perils I gave way alto- 
gether. Thyra held me in her arms till my sob- 
bing ceased. The faint light of morning came 
in upon us sitting there desolate. 

When I looked up at last and saw the tears on 
the cheeks of my friend, I realized how selfish I 
had been. Thyra had sorrows too. She did not 
know whether her brother was alive or dead. 
He was two years older than Thyra, and had been 
away from home on an errand at the time that the 
onset was made by the persecutors on Thyra’s fam- 
ily. Their boat-home had been burned, and the old 
grandfather killed. Thyra, the brother, and the 
grandfather had comprised the family, for the 
father and the mother of my friend had been 
dead for years. Thyra had now no place to go to. 


156 IN EDITH A’S days 

It was well I could bring her here to the treck- 
schuyL 

If I had known where my aunt and Stephen 
were I might, perhaps, have communicated with 
them. But my aunt now made a living by carry- 
ing on her own large boat, produce to and from 
the markets. Stephen was becoming a great trav- 
eler and a shrewd worker, who, with the assist- 
ance of a big dog, managed to keep pulling the 
large boat along as the two trotted beside the 
canals. My aunt could stay on board and act as 
steerswoman. Between them, she and her son 
made a comfortable living. Where they were 
now I did not know. Whether they had heard of 
our calamity I very much doubted. Probably my 
aunt’s boat had not passed here since the night of 
our capture. 

Morning came, but we dared not show ourselves 
on the boat, and so remained hidden. I showed 
Thyra where we kept our eatables and our drink- 
ing water. We took some bread and cheese, and 
ate with tears. 

“ Oh, Thyra, Thyra ! ” I cried, “ if only we knew 
where they all are, your brother, and my father 
and my mother, we would go away with them 
from this dreadful country. But how can we go 
away and leave them ? We should never know 
what became of them. ” 

And we sobbed together. 

So the sad day went by. We could look out at 
the canal, and once I saw a boat loaded with peat 


ESCAPE 


157 


and towed by a man, a woman, and a child, one 
behind another, with a cord attached to a sort of 
leather band. And once, another boat went by 
towed by a man, helped by a large dog. But no 
one came near to disturb our treckschuyt. We 
read some in the New Testament, and I told 
Thyra how my father used to hide with the book 
in the fagot pile. Thyra said she thought her 
brother had had with him a copy of the New Tes- 
tament, which was, of course, in Dutch, although 
Thyra and he could read and talk both Dutch and 
English. 

We watched diligently for any appearance of 
my aunt’s boat, and Thyra and I talked of the 
horrors of the Spanish Inquisition, which the 
emperor seemed to wish to bring upon the Low 
Countries. Thyra knew more than I upon the 
subject, although I had heard horrors enough, and 
the ghastly remembrances that had looked from 
the dying priest’s eyes were fresh in my mind. 
But Thyra told me of the horrible tortures that 
the Spanish Inquisition was accustomed to inflict 
on its victims. At midnight, she said, in some 
dungeon, the executioner, who was covered from 
head to foot with a black robe, and whose eyes 
glared through holes cut in the hood that muffled 
his face, would torture a victim with every form 
of agony the monks had been able to invent ; by 
water, by weights, by pulleys, by screws, by the 
rack. The victim was often not tormented to 
death, but was saved for unlimited periods of tor- 


158 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


ture. Thyra told me that she had heard of per- 
sons who had borne the torture and the Spanish 
dungeon for fifteen years, and at last had been 
burned at the stake. For, if a confession was 
wrung from a victim under torture, the result was 
not release, but burning. There was no escape. If 
a priest himself was a victim, before he was burned 
his hands, lips, and shaven crown were scraped 
with a piece of glass, by which act the oil of his 
consecration was supposed to be removed. Then 
he was put in with the other victims, and all 
mounted the scaffold, and were delivered by the 
inquisitors into the hands of the executioner. 
The inquisitors, on handing him the prisoners, 
would make a sarcastic request that he would deal 
tenderly with them without blood-letting or in- 
jury. If a victim remained steadfast to the last, 
he was burned alive. But if he renounced his 
faith, he was first strangled. 

My heart seemed to die within me at Thyra’s 
words. What awful thing might not be done to 
those dearest to me? What might they not 
already have endured ? 

“ Perish the Inquisition ! ” the dying priest had 
whispered fiercely. 

Oh, that so foul an institution should lay its 
hand on the Tow Countries ! Oh, that we were 
not bound to Spain ! 

“ Do you know,” said Thyra to me, “ that peo- 
ple say that St. Dominic was the founder of the 
Inquisition ? ’ ’ 


KSCAPK 


159 


St. Dominic. He was a saint very familiar to 
me, for my aunt had often told me of him and his 
marvelous deeds ; that often he floated in the air 
before the eyes of his disciples ; that the . most 
intense flames would not burn the parchment 
upon which were written the divine meditations 
of this saint ; that once when Dominic was stand- 
ing in the midst of a pious throng in the convent 
of St. Sixtus, talking with the Cardinal Stephen, 
a messenger, weeping, came to announce that the 
nephew of Stephen had been thrown from his 
horse, and lay dead at the gate of the convent. 

The Cardinal Stephen overcome, fell weeping 
on Dominic, and the compassionate saint ordered 
that the body of the dead young man should be 
brought in. Dominic commanded the altar to be 
arranged for celebrating mass ; he fell into an 
ecstasy, and as he touched the sacred elements 
he rose in air, and hung kneeling in the empty 
space above the astonished spectators. He came 
down and made the sign of the cross over the 
dead ; he ordered the young man to arise, and the 
dead sprang up, alive and well, in sight of the 
witnesses around ; so they said. 

So it was this saint who was reputed to have 
founded that thing of blood, the Spanish Inquisi- 
tion, this “ Holy Office ” which was to devour the 
Dow Countries. 

“Oh,” I answered Thyra, “it cannot be ; it can- 
not be that the Emperor Charles will want to kill 
so many of us ! ” 


l6o IN EDITH A’S days 

lyittle did I know the Emperor Charles. Eittle 
did I know the excess of cruelty to which a de- 
voted bigot may go, under a mistaken idea of 
what will please God. Neither could I look for- 
ward at the coming years, and see the Low Coun- 
tries deluged with Anabaptist blood, shed in the 
name of religion, because Charles V. thought that 
what he was pleased to call “ heresy ” should be 
destroyed. I did not know that Charles’ grand- 
mother Isabella, who had been persuaded to let 
the Inquisition rage in Spain, had said : “In the 
love of Christ and his maid-mother, I have caused 
great misery, and have depopulated towns and dis- 
tricts, provinces and kingdoms.” 

A strange thing to do for the “ love of Christ,” 
one would think. How little can those who are 
guided by the priests know what will please our 
Lord ! I did not know that Charles V., our em- 
peror, regretted that he had ever kept his word to 
Luther and allowed him to depart in safety, when 
he had had a chance to kill that good man. It 
was well I could not look forward at the future 
years of Charles’ power over the Low Countries, 
and then on to the reign of his son Philip. It 
was he, who once, when there was a great 
burning of victims at Valladolid, in Spain, was 
accosted by one Carlos de Sessa, a young noble- 
man of distinguished character who was about to 
suffer, and who passing by the throne to the stake, 
said to the king : “ How can you thus look on, 
and permit me to be burned ? ” 


ESCAPE 


i6i 


And Philip had made answer, “ I would carry 
the wood to burn my own son withal, were he as 
wicked as you.” 

Small hope might any “ heretic ” of the I^ow 
Countries have of life, if he fell into the hands of 
either Charles or his son. And an Anabaptist was 
counted the worst kind of heretic. 

The day went by and Thyra and I were not 
molested on board the old treckshuyt. The night 
came. Thyra was distressed and restless, and I 
felt so sorrowful and uneasy I could not sleep. 
How could either of us sleep, not knowing what 
was happening in the Hague ? The night hours 
passed as silently as the waters of the canal. I 
lay still, hoping that Thyra slept, but on my 
drawing a long breath once she sighed also, and I 
knew she was awake. 

“ Perhaps to-morrow my aunt may come,” I whis- 
pered ; “ though she is of the Romish belief still.” 

But Thyra only sobbed. 

A little while after this we heard somebody 
softly come on board. Whoever the person was, 
he did not come into the compartment of the 
treckschuyt where we were hidden. Soon there 
were muffled voices, and Thyra and I tremblingly 
felt the old treckschuyt begin to move through 
the water. The boat was evidently being towed 
somewhere by some people who thought that the 
Anabaptist family had been exterminated and 
would never need the treckschuyt again. 

I. 


i63 


IN KDITHA’S DAYS 


What should we do ? Where were we going ? 

The old treckschiiyt moved very quietly. 
Driven desperate at last I crept to the door, and 
peered out. Everything else was so still that I 
could hear the rustle of the sails of a windmill 
on shore. I discovered that there were some six 
men on board. Four of them appeared to be 
prisoners, over whom another man held guard 
while the sixth man managed the helm. A rope 
stretched from the iron ring under the prow and 
ended off somewhere in the dark, I knew on 
shore. Perhaps the treckschuyt was being towed 
by men, perhaps by a horse ridden by a man. 
Our boat passed along like a shadow among 
shadows. 

“We are going back to the Hague,” I con- 
cluded. “I do not believe it is safe there for us.” 

I crept back to Thyra. 

“If we could slip out and get our little boat,” 
I whispered, “ we might lower it and float away, 
if we could do it without being seen.” 

But we dared not attempt this. Moreover, at 
that moment, the treckschuyt stopped, and three 
more men, prisoners also, appeared on board. 

Now, indeed, we saw certainly that we could 
not obtain the small boat without attracting atten- 
tion. And so once more we passed on up to the 
Hague. 

At the landing the men all left the treckschuyt. 
From the low remarks we had caught, we were 
sure that the three prisoners who had last come 


KSCAPE 


163 

on board were Anabaptists, for the guard bad 
mockingly spoken to them as “ Re-baptizers,” and 
bad threatened to throw them, chained together 
as they were, into the canal. Also, from some- 
thing the steersman had said, we learned that it 
was probable that the old treckschuyt would be used 
hereafter for the conveying of those heretics who 
were on their way to prison. That was the last 
thing I learned before the men went ashore. 

Thyra and I felt, therefore that we had little 
time in which to abandon the treckschuyt. We 
let down the small boat, put in it what provisions 
we had, together with some clothing, stepped 
aboard and pushed off softly in the dark. But no 
one need think that I had left the New Testa- 
ment behind in the old treckschuyt. That dear 
book I had safely with me. 

We rowed a short distance softly, lest one of 
the men might come-back to the treckschuyt and 
hear us. Then, when we thought we were far 
enough away, having tied a rope to our boat, 
Thyra guided it to land and she and I stepped 
ashore in the dark, and hand in hand ran, towing 
the boat. Our only desire was to rush as far away 
from the treckschuyt as possible. And yet as I 
ran along the canal-path, my heart turned back to 
the Hague. Had I dared I would have wished 
we were running the other way to enter the 
Hague and to search every building of that city 
to find those for whom Thyra and I so sorely 
longed. Alas ! What had become of them ? 


IN editha’s days 


164 

Once in a while we stopped and panted for 
breath, and looked fearfully behind us, ready to 
abandon everything and flee to the shadow of the 
trees by the canal if we thought we were pur- 
sued. Though Thyra declared that if anybody 
tried to drown her in the canal, according to the 
threat of the men to the Anabaptist captives on 
board the treckschuyt^ it would be discovered that 
she could swim well. And when I asked her if 
she supposed that many Anabaptists had been 
drowned, she answered that in Zurich, two years 
ago, there was an edict published which made it 
death for any to baptize by immersion, and under 
this law some Anabaptists had been tied back to 
back and thrown so into the water. Then I re- 
membered that my father had once told me of 
this same thing. 

“Where shall we go?” Thyra asked me ab- 
ruptly. 

And I answered : “ Let us go and hide away in 
the sand dunes, toward the village of Scheven- 
ingen.” 

Without a word, Thyra drew the boat to land. 
We took our bundles and cast the boat adrift. 
We turned our faces toward the direction of 
Scheveningen and hurried away, though we could 
not run so fast as we had before, because now we 
had our bundles to carry, though they were not 
very heavy. 

By-and-by we came to a place where a desert of 
sand suddenly seemed to stretch before us. A 


ESCAPE 


165 

continuous murmur of the sea was on the salt air. 
We had reached the dunes. Toiling over and 
around one hillock of sand after another we walked 
for a while, and then so weary that we could hardly 
keep awake, we asked the protection of the Lord, 
and lay down in a hollow surrounded by the 
hillocks of sand, where we soon slept, though I 
could hardly realize yet that we were out in the 
world and not confined in prison. I had little 
hope but that we should speedily be retaken. 


CHAPTER XII 


editha’s experience 

I T was morning when I awoke, and Thyra was 
still asleep. I sat up, and looked around me. 
Overhead was a gray sky. On all sides of me rose 
yellow hills of sand, from thirty to forty feet high, 
or a little more. I crept to the top of one, and 
peered cautiously out. I saw no person, but the 
hillocks made the region seem almost mountainous. 
There were three ranges of dunes, and they hin- 
dered one from seeing over the flats. The hil- 
locks also prevented me from seeing the village 
of Scheveningen, excepting its church spire. 

I slid down from my hillock as Thyra awoke. 
We stayed in our place of refuge all day. Toward 
evening we spied a woman of Scheveningen 
striding along with a cart drawn by two great 
dogs. She had been to the Hague to sell fish and 
was going home. Thyra and I, from behind a 
hillock, watched her, and I know wished that we 
also had a home to go to. 

The woman wore a queer hat of straw, a brown- 
ish-colored mantle lined with red, a white skirt, 
white wooden shoes, and walked with long strides. 

“I wonder if we dare trust her?” I whispered 
to Thyra. 

i66 


editha’s experience 167 

She did not know. We stayed again that night 
among the yellow dunes, and we finished the last 
of our provisions. Early the next morning we 
saw the same woman striding by with a basketful 
of fish on her head. We watched her. 

‘‘ She has a good face,” commented Thyfa. 
‘‘ Can you talk the dialect of Scheveningen ! ” 

“ No,” I answered. 

“ Neither can I,” confessed Thyra, regretfully. 
“ Perhaps she may understand Dutch. Let us 
watch for her when she comes back, and speak to 
her. I do not believe she will harm us. And we 
must do something. Our food is gone.” 

It was several hours before the woman returned. 
We had seen two or three of the other inhabi- 
tants of Scheveningen pass carrying fish ; but we 
preferred to wait for our fish-selling woman. 

When she passed us, we called to her, and al- 
though she could talk with us but little, she 
seemed to understand our Dutch, and to compre- 
hend what our trouble was. She beckoned us to 
follow her, and guided us through the ranges of 
dunes till at last we came to the village of Schev- 
eningen. 

There she went with us up a narrow lane to a 
house, said to a woman there, “ Doopsgezinden,” 
(Baptists), and then left us. Our new friend, who 
was very grave and dignified, as are all the inhabi- 
tants of Scheveningen, kindly gave, us food, and 
seemed to wish to be most hospitable. She was 
able to understand Dutch, and we told her all our 


i68 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


story without reserve. In return she showed a 
place where we might live as long as we wished, 
she said, and Thyra and I entreated her to ask 
any of the Scheveningen women whom she could 
trust, to search when they visited the Hague, and 
see if they could at all discover what had become 
of my father and mother and Thyra’s brother. 
Also I besought her to look for the coming of my 
aunt’s boat to the Hague, for Thyra and I did 
not dare to go to that city. 

All this the woman kindly promised to do, and 
I, who afterward heard her singing what I knew 
to be a Psalm, felt no more fear of her. We found 
that the people of Scheveningen generally were 
grave and devout. They had their Bibles, their 
hymns, their Psalms. We could hardly have dis- 
covered a place where we would have felt more 
safe, even though our surroundings seemed strange. 
Thyra and I stayed closely at home, but we helped 
the women all we could with their fish and their 
household duties, for we did not wish to be bur- 
densome. And we waited, oh, how anxiously we 
waited, every day for news from the Hague ! 
Thyra grew thin with watching and waiting and 
grief, and I could not comfort her, being too spent 
with the dreadful anxiety myself. 

For at any hour news might come, and we 
started at every sound not so much for fear of re- 
capture as for thinking who might be coming. 
Some of the fish-selling women I knew were try- 
ing as well as they could to gain information for 


kditha’s experience 169 

Tis. And yet day after day the women would come 
in, and Thyra and I would look hastily to see if 
news had come, and each woman would shake her 
head. 

But one day there came to the cottage a woman 
who rushed to me, and caught me in her arms, 
crying : “ My child ! my poor child ! ” 

It was not my mother. It was my aunt, and we 
sobbed together, till looking up, I saw Stephen. 

Oh, it seemed almost like home again to see 
them both ! But my aunt was wild with fear over 
my mother’s fate. 

“ Oh, if your father had let that New Testament 
alone, we might all have been living safely home 
in Caversham,” she wailed, wringing her hands. 
“ See what trouble that book has brought.” 

My aunt urged that we go back with her to her 
large boat. She wanted me near her, and declared 
that Stephen and she would conceal us. 

“ Come, you and Thyra both,” she urged. 

At first I thought perhaps we would go. But 
when my aunt spied among my things the New 
Testament, her face changed. 

“ Did you save that?'''' she asked. “ I thought 
you had left that book on board the treckschuyt.'''' 

“ I would not have left our New Testament be- 
hind,” I answered quietly. “We Anabaptists love 
the New Testament.” 

My aunt stood, hesitating, perplexed. 

“Bditha,” she said, at last, “I would be glad 
to have you and Thyra on our boat, but I cannot 


170 


IN editha’s days 


risk my life for your ideas. You know the edict 
of the emperor is that there must be no reading 
of the Scriptures in the lyow Countries. Leave 
the New Testament here. It has done harm 
enough already. And above all things leave your 
Anabaptist ideas.” 

I looked at Stephen, but he avoided my gaze. 
He knew well enough what good the New Testa- 
ment had done. I was persuaded that he had not 
forgotten those days when he read the word in 
our treckschuyt^ and when he thought he became a 
Christian. But his mother’s influence was strong 
upon him now. I looked at my aunt. 

“ I cannot leave the New Testament,” I replied. 
“ I think perhaps Thyra and I would better stay 
here, after all ; for we are both Anabaptists, and 
it might bring trouble upon you to have us with 
you.” 

And after some persuasion, my aunt left us. 
For she desired to be at the Hague to search for 
my mother. 

My aunt was kind and thoughtful too, for she 
made Thyra and me take from her purse some 
little money, and told us that she and Stephen 
would search for Thyra’s brother too. 

And him they did find. One day toward even- 
ing Thyra looking out, saw a young man running 
through the yellow sand dunes, and she cried : 
“ Oh, Gaspar ! Caspar ! ” and flew to meet him. 

Stephen had found Thyra’s brother wandering 
disconsolately, thinking his sister dead as well as 


EDITH A’S experience 171 

his grandfather. And Stephen had sent the 
young man immediately to Scheveningen. 

How happy Thyra was after that ! It is true 
she and Gaspar missed the dear old grandfather, 
but they knew he was safe in heaven. They had 
no one on earth to be anxious for, as I had. 
Though their boat-home was gone. Gasper and 
she could make another home for themselves, and 
they soon did so in a little cottage in Scheven- 
ingen, taking me in with them. And Gaspar 
risked many times going to the Hague and try- 
ing to discover some clue that would lead to news 
concerning my father and my mother. But 
though he spent much time, he brought me no 
news. Neither could Stephen and my aunt find 
out anything, though they spent money and 
searched for months. And I myself went to the 
Hague, and hunted in vain, regardless of danger. 
At last my aunt gave up all hope, and went away 
in her boat with Stephen. She offered to take 
me too, if I would leave the New Testament be- 
hind, but I could not, and Thyra and Gaspar said 
they wanted me, and I still kept hoping that pos- 
sibly I might hear something if I waited long 
enough. So I stayed in Scheveningen, going to 
the Hague as often as I dared. 

And the days came and went among the small, 
black cottages of that village. Gaspar became 
one of the fishermen for herring, and went away 
with the fleet every June, and Thyra and I 
stayed in the village where only women and chil- 


173 


IN editiia’s days 


dreti were left in the fishing season. And the 
boats would come back, and in some families 
there would be joy and in some grief. Some of 
the fishermen would never return, for the sea held 
its dead. 

But Gaspar always came back safely. And be- 
cause I could not bear to burden Thyra and him 
with my grief, I used to wander out among the 
thinly grassed sand dunes when my work was done, 
and there by myself I would hide, and sob, and pray, 
and sometimes read my Knglish New Testament. 
But more often I could not see to read because of 
my tears. For it seemed to me that my heart 
would break when I thought that perhaps during 
these many months my father and my mother 
were kept and tortured. I used to wake in the 
night shaking with horror, thinking of what might 
be happening during the dark hours, and I would 
cry in agony, “O God, grant that my father 
and my mother may have been killed the night 
they were taken prisoners rather than kept tor- 
tured till now.” I would try to sleep, and would 
dream that I saw my father or my mother en- 
during some dreadful torture of which I had 
heard the dying priest speak. 

And the heart-aching months went on. Three 
1535 y^ars had gone by, and one day when I 
was out among those sand dunes nearest 
the water, looking at the melancholy sea, shad- 
owed by the dense cloudsj Gaspar came striding 
through the heavy sand, and sat down beside me. 


editha’s experience 


173 


At first he did not say anything, for he had seen the 
tears on my face, though I wiped them away has- 
tily enough. 

So we sat there on the sand dune, with the sound 
of the surge of the sea in our ears, and my heart 
beat heavily, for I knew why he had come. 

We had sat quite a while gazing out at the rest- 
less green waters and at the misty horizon, when 
he turned and looked me in the face and said ear- 
nestly, “ Bditha, away beyond this sea lies Eng- 
land.” 

“Yes,” I answered. 

“ And many Anabaptists are thinking of cross- 
ing over from the Eow Countries to England, and 
making homes there,” he continued. “ It cannot 
be worse there than it is here. King Henry can- 
not be worse than the Emperor Charles. He 
means to kill all the Anabaptists in the the Low 
Countries. I have been thinking for some time 
of going to England.” 

And then he stopped. 

“ I have stayed here,” he went on. Then he 
broke off and looked at the sea. 

And finally he turned to me, with the color 
flushing through all his weather-beaten, manly 
face. 

“ I cannot go to England without you,” he said. 
“ Home would not be home without you, Editha ; 
dear Editha, do you love me as I love you ? ” 

And in the hearts of those two Anabaptists 
among the yellow dunes, there was a happiness 


174 


IN editha’s days 


that the Emperor Charles could not, with all his 
edicts, take away. 

But I could not promise Caspar to go to Eng- 
land. It would seem like giving up all hope of 
ever hearing of my father and my mother again 
if I went so far away. 

But Caspar reminded me : “ It has been three 
years since it all happened. Three years, Editha *, 
do you still hope? ” 

There was a great and tender pity in his voice, 
so that the tears came again to my eyes, but I re- 
plied : “ Oh, Caspar, I cannot go ! I cannot go ! 
I must see if I cannot find them.” 

And Caspar did not urge me, though he af- 
firmed : “ Editha, you will never cease to grieve 
as long as you live here, so near where it all hap- 
pened.” 

But I told him that England would be a prison 
for me, since I should always be thinking of the 
Hague and wishing to go searching there. 

“ I know,” he replied kindly, “ I know.” 

And he said no more about it, but we went 
home together, and I had never before thought 
that the way across the dunes could be a happy 
one, so often had I trodden it weary at heart and 
anguished at that one idea I always carried in my 
brain : “ Shall I ever find them ? Shall I ever find 
them again ? ” 

As for Thyra, my cousin Stephen came often 
through the sand dunes, and I was not so stupid 
as to think he wished to see me. But when I 


editha’s experience 175 

spoke once jestingly to her about him, Thyra 
flushed and looked me straight in the eyes, and 
said resolutely : “ ket your cousin Stephen prove 
himself a man who dares live what he believes, or 
else I will never be his wife. He knows that we 
Anabaptists are right. He has not forgotten the 
reading of the New Testament in your treckschuyt ; 
and yet he dares not come out and be one of us. 
His mother holds him to the Roman church. 
She took his Dutch New Testament and sunk it 
in the canal. He is grown old enough to have a 
man’s will, and yet he fears the . persecution to 
which he knows the Anabaptists are doomed. 
Let him show himself a man since he believes 
himself a Christian. Let him obey the com- 
mand of Christ and be baptized. If Stephen 
dare not do that, then he may learn that an Ana- 
baptist girl will never marry a coward.” 

Her eyes flashed with indignation as she spoke, 
and I surmised that Stephen had already heard 
some such remarks from her. Therefore I thought 
he deserved to be told the plain truth, and I knew 
that he would feel it more from Thyra’s lips than 
from mine. Yet I felt sure that Thyra did not look 
upon my winsome cousin with disfavor. If women 
like Thyra and the multitude of others who held 
the Anabaptist faith could brave death in a horri- 
ble form for their obedience to God’s Word, what 
was Stephen indeed but a coward if he refused to 
be baptized when his conscience told him that he 
ought so to acknowledge Christ. 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


176 

I came upon the two, one evening, when Thyra 
was reading aloud from her Testament. Stephen’s 
head was bent on his hands as he listened. I 
caught sight of the heading of Thyra’s page, 
which was Mark i : 10 : “ And straightway com- 
ing up out of the water, he saw the heavens 
opened, and the Spirit like a dove descending 
upon him.” 

I knew that my cousin Stephen was likely to 
hear some things he would remember, so I slipped 
away, and left those two dear young people to 
their discussion. If Stephen had been uncon- 
vinced of the truth of Anabaptist doctrine, the 
situation would have been different. But he had 
read God’s word. He knew the truth, and did it 
not. He thought himself a Christian. Why 
should he shrink from baptism ? 

“ I am glad that Gaspar is not like Stephen,” I 
congratulated myself under my breath. “ If the 
Anabaptists gain religious freedom for themselves 
and for others, it will only be as staunch defenders 
of the doctrines of God’s word, not as cowards.” 

I went to the Hague often in these days, but I 
discovered nothing. And another year passed, 
and still there was no news, and Gaspar said to 
me : “ It is four years. Will you go ? ” 

At first I thought I would, for hope had died in 
me that I should ever see my father or my mother 
again. But when it occurred to me that after I 
had gone to England perhaps some day my father 
might escape from prison, and come out an almost 


kditha’s experience 


177 


helpless cripple, from the torture he had endured, 
or I might find that my mother, maimed, broken, 
had obtained release, and I had not been near to 
meet her, I cried out: “Oh, Gaspar, Gaspar, I 
cannot go ! I can never go away from here. 

He looked very sober for a moment, and 1530 
then he answered quietly : “It shall be as 
you say, Bditha.” 

So it was settled that in a few weeks we would 
be married and would still stay in Scheveningen. 
And yet, I trembled when I thought that it was 
my word that would keep us in the how Coun- 
tries where the persecutors’ hearts were fierce. 
Queen Dowager Mary of Hungary, sister of the 
emperor, had written to her brother, three years 
before this, that in her opinion “all heretics, 
whether repentant or not, should be prosecuted 
with such severity as that error might be at once 
extinguished, care only being taken that the 
provinces were not entirely depopulated.” 

With this merciful limitation, a whole system 
of murder was planned. In 1535 an imperial 
edict was issued at Brussels, condemning all here- 
tics to death. If a man repented he was to be 
killed with the sword. If a woman repented, she 
was to be buried alive. If a man or a woman per- 
sisted in being a heretic, he or she was to be 
burned. 

Moreover there was especially great trouble in 
store for us, for there had been, in 1535, an up- 
rising at Munster, charged by our enemies to the 

M 


IN EDITIIA’S DAYS 


178 

Anabaptists, and we were looked upon as being 
the most dreadful sinners. The blackest mis- 
representation and the sharpest punishment were 
to be ours. 

And yet think how devout a man, in the eyes 
of the priests, our Emperor Charles was ! He 
heard mass every day. Every Sunday and every 
holiday he listened to a sermon, and he confessed 
and received the sacrament four times a year. 
Sometimes at midnight he would be kneeling 
before a crucifix. In Eent he ate no meat, and 
was extraordinarily diligent in trying to discover 
and punish any man, no matter what his station, 
who did not fast through all Eent’s forty days. 
So, I suppose, he thought to serve and please God, 
Our Lady, and the saints. 

Yet it seemed hard that we, who tried to serve 
God according to his word, should be denounced 
and called “ Miinsterites,’’ that name of shame 
which was to cling to us for so many years. And, 
alas ! it was not only those of the church of Rome 
who continued to be our enemies, but it was those 
opposed to Rome who joined hands with the ene- 
mies of God against the Anabaptists ! Where 
was the religious liberty we craved for all men ? 

Yet, sometimes when it seemed hardest that we 
should be so persecuted, I remembered my father’s 
words : “ Do you not know that we Anabaptists 
have more of the truth than others, because we 
hold more closely to the New Testament? That 
is the reason we are so persecuted ! Yea, but our 


editha’s experience 


179 


persecution will work out the religious freedom, 
not only of ourselves, but of all other men. So 
I hope and believe.” 

It was in this year we heard news from Eng- 
land. Sir Thomas More, he who wrote so bitterly 
against Tyndale, and who issued that declaration 
against all English translations of the Scriptures, 
was dead. He had been beheaded. Truly he had 
not found King Henry’s favor very lasting. I re- 
membered how angry I had felt with Sir Thomas 
More on the day when I, in rash defiance, climbed 
the fagot heap by daylight and boldly dropped 
myself down into the big hole, and there read the 
New Testament. Sir Thomas More had gone to 
give his account to God now, and Tyndale, the 
translator of the New Testament into English, 
had also gone; for an English student, Henry 
Phillips, had by base treachery betrayed Tyndale 
into the hands of the emperor’s officers at Brussels. 
King Henry of England was, of course, anxious 
that Tyndale should be convicted, and, after 
eighteen months of imprisonment in the castle of 
Vilvoorden, near Brussels, the translator of our 
English Testament was strangled and burnt at the 
stake. And, just before he died, he prayed : O 
Eord, open the King of England’s eyes ! ” 

John Frith, he who was Tyndale’s friend, and 
who had been one of that band of students once 
shut in the fish-cellar at Oxford for reading the 
New Testament, was dead now also. For he, 
having been invited to return to England from 


l8o IN KDITHA’S DAYS 

the continent whither he had fled, came trustingly 
back, and was taken. He was put into the stocks 
at Reading, not so very far from our old home at 
Caversham. Afterward he was committed to the 
Tower, and was burned to death. So all three of 
these men. Sir Thomas More, Tyndale, and John 
Frith, had gone to give their account to God. 

When I thought of the multitudes of people 
who had suffered since we left England, my heart 
misgave me whether it was better to stay in the 
Eow Countries, or to return to King Henry’s 
realm. For it was terrible in England soon after 
we left ! The bishops filled their prisons with 
countless, victims. People were racked, tortured, 
imprisoned, for believing that the bread of the 
communion is not the real body of Christ, or for 
teaching their children or reading to their neigh- 
bors a chapter of the New Testament, or for hav- 
ing a New Testament in their possession. 

Such things had been in England since we left, 
and the same king yet reigned there. I had lived 
in England, and I could not feel sure that we 
should be safe if we went back ; for the hand of 
both Romanist and Protestant was against the 
Anabaptists, and it seemed as though few besides 
us believed in religious liberty. 

So in these days I lived in a strange mixture 
of happiness and fear. I wondered that I, who 
had thought life was over for me, and that noth- 
ing more remained but long, heart-breaking search- 
ing and waiting for those dear ones who never 


editha’s experience l8l 

came, should feel so happy as I always did when 
Gaspar was with me. Not that I forgot the fate 
of my father and my mother, or that I longed and 
sorrowed less for them, but a new joy had entered 
my heart, and the world was different to me in 
spite of the emperor and his bloody edicts. 

It lacked but a week of my intended marriage 
day, when I and two other women, while at the 
fish-market in the Hague, were suddenly appre- 
hended by some of the soldiery, and immediately 
taken to prison. The two other women were ac- 
cused of being heretics, but I, as an Anabaptist, 
was to be treated with more speedy severity than 
they. I was bound, and two soldiers were in- 
structed to bury me alive when night should come. 
In vain I protested that this punishment was for 
those who recanted, and I, not having denied my 
faith should, according to law, be reserved to be 
burnt at the stake. 

This I said to them, partly because I would not 
be thought by any to have denied my faith, for 
indeed I had not done so, and partly because I 
hoped that some of the other Scheveningen 
women who were in the fish-market at the time 
of my arrest, would tell Gaspar and Stephen what 
had befallen me, and possibly they might be able 
to devise some way of helping me, if only my 
death might be delayed. 

But my protestations availed nothing. There 
were two hours yet before sunset, and though I 
was not afraid to die, life and love are sweet to 


1 82 IN EDITH A’S days 

the young, and I wished that we had fled to 
England. 

“But all that is over,” I thought, as I waited 
for the night that would bring the execution of 
my dreadful sentence. “ I go to-night to a better 
country than England. I go to a land of freedom 
forevermore ! ” 

My taking and imprisonment had been accom- 
plished so suddenly that I could hardly realize my 
situation. I hoped that after I was dead Caspar 
would flee from this blood-stained land, and not 
linger here trying to discover what had become 
of me, as I before had stayed attempting to find 
out what had been my parents’ doom, till too late. 

At night I found myself led out to die, and a 
number of soldiers conducted me in grim silence 
without the city. There was darkness, save for 
the few lights that the men carried. Having 
marched some distance a halt was made, and two 
men speedily dug a deep hole, into which I was 
lowered, bound and helpless as I was. I had ex- 
pected to be fastened into a coffin-shaped recept- 
acle, but I was put in my grave without such 
ceremony. I stood upright, since there was a 
great sufficiency of room. One man was left to 
bury me. The other soldiers hurried away, for 
there were certain heretics that were to be appre- 
hended, if possible, that night, a clue to their 
whereabouts having been supposed to be found. 

The man in whose charge I was left began to 
shovel in the dirt upon me. I called to him, and 


EDITHA’S EXPERIENCE 1 83 

begged him to release me, but he made no answer. 
I besought him with all the energy of which I 
was capable to help me and not kill me. 

“ If you would not wish my blood on your soul 
in that day when you will stand face to face with 
God, I adjure you let me go free,” I implored 
him. “ I have done no wrong.” 

But the man did not reply. The earth fell lei- 
surely at first. Tug as I might at my bonds,strain- 
ing every muscle, I could not release myself. I 
had been bound too securely. Then at last I 
gave up all hope of escape. 

I remembered the dead Anabaptist of years 
before. I seemed to see his face again in the 
dark, his eyes looking up with their mute appeal 
to the God of freedom. 

“ My blood will also cry out unto God,” I said 
to myself. “ O God, see — see what thy people, 
the Anabaptists, suffer ! We die, O Lord ! Wilt 
thou not send freedom to the earth? O God, 
see the tears, the groans, the agony, the blood of 
thy servants, the Anabaptists, who have followed 
the precepts of thy word. Hear our prayer, O 
God, and send religious freedom to all men.” 

The earth fell regularly and swiftly upon me. 
I could feel the wind of its coming, and instantly 
the force of the earth as it fell. Now the earth 
was almost up to my knees. Now it was higher, 
so that I could just begin feel the accumulating 
mass with the tips of my fingers, as my hands 
hung bound at my sides. The earth was being 


IN editha’s days 


184 

shoveled in so fast that I had to turn my head to 
get breath. I glanced at the sky, saw it an in- 
stant through the small lumps of falling earth, 
and then shut my eyes tightly to avoid particles 
of the soil. 

“ That is the last time I shall look at the sky 
with these eyes,” I thought. “It cannot take 
long to die. Only a few minutes more, and I 
shall be in heaven. Dear Lord, I am not afraid 
to go where I shall see thee. Oh, my Master, thou 
art with me now.” 

The earth had reached my elbows. My arms 
were absolutely immovable, as were my feet, held 
by the heavy pressuie of earth on them. 

“I shall see father and mother,” I thought. 
“ I am almost sure they are dead, and if they are, 
I shall see them in a few minutes. Oh, I shall be 
so glad to see them ! I shall ” 

A shovelful of earth struck me almost directly 
in the face. The earth was higher, beginning to 
press on my chest. The weight seemed to drive 
the breath out of my lungs. I appeared to my- 
self to breathe, but little below my throat. A 
choking sensation oppressed me. The earth rose 
to one shoulder. The pressure seemed to send so 
much blood to my head that I grew dizzy. A 
ring, Caspar’s ring, that I wore on one hand, 
scorched my finger as if with molten fire. The 
ring seemed to burn into my flesh, so heavy was 
the pressure upon my hand. A few more shovel- 
fuls of earth, and the work of my executioner 


editha’s experience 185 

would be done. When he too came to die, would 
my face, looking out of the dark of this pit of 
death, haunt him, as that suffocated man’s face 
had troubled the dying priest. 

I gasped and panted for breath. I could not 
move save my neck and jaws and eyelids. I tried 
to get breath and yet not open my lips, so fearful 
was I that some of the falling earth might fill my 
mouth. A horrible dread of suffocation seized 
me. I could not endure it. I would not recant. 
No, no, it was not that ! But to smother, to gasp, 
to choke, to suffocate. 

I struggled to move, but my feet and my hands 
could not stir. The earth came faster. I dared not 
waste my breath to scream. It would do no good. 
I had not the strength anyway. The earth rose over 
my neck, to my chin. Two shovelfuls of earth 
fell on my head. The earth rose higher, higher. 
My head would soon be covered. I managed 
to turn it a little to one side. My mouth opened 
The earth fell in. I tried to eject it. I succeeded. 
I gasped. Some earth fell. My head seemed on 
fire. My mouth wanted to open again. I kept it 
shut. Through some great, dim distance of space, 
I heard a noise, a voice, a struggle. My mouth 
wanted to open. I held it shut. It wanted to 
open. It would open. It should not. It did 
open. The earth fell in. 

“ This is death,” I thought. 

I felt myself try to shut my mouth. The earth 
w^ there, Faintly I felt the groping of a hand 


i86 


IN editha’s days 


that caught my hair. I felt hands that tore at the 
earth about my neck, that dug furiously at the 
soil. And far, far, oh, infinitely far away, was a 
voice ^hat came, whether from time or eternity I 
did not know : “ Editha ! my Editha ! Eive a little 
longer! Editha! Editha! My Editha!’’ 

I could not understand. Everything was very 
far away. But by-and-by, through the mist of 
unconsciousness, I began to feel that for some 
reason the earth on my chest did not oppress me 
any more. And then I gradually came to know that 
there was no earth there. Then I felt that I was 
being somehow dug out of my burial place, but yet 
I could not open my eyes. I seemed to go to sleep ; 
but after a while I felt that I was lying down, and 
1 wondered how I could be lying down in that 
hole where there was not room. And next I 
realized that I was lying on the ground. Surely 
I was out of that hole. I drew a breath. 

“Editha ! ” said a voice close to my ear; and I 
made a great effort, and opened my eyes. 

Gaspar was bending beside me, kneeling, and 
the tears were running down his white face. 

“ You are alive,” he whispered. “ Alive ! ” 

I could not speak. But Gaspar caught me up, 
and he and Stephen ran, carrying me. I saw 
that it was night still, but somehow my experi- 
ence had taken all my strength from me. I could 
not even hold my eyes open. After being hurried 
for a while through the darkness, I felt that we 
neared the sand dunes of Scheveningen. Gas- 


EDITHA’S EXPERIENCE 187 

par and Stephen seemed to be striding through 
sand, and the odor of the sea struck my nostrils. 
Swiftly we rushed on across the dunes, and by the 
time we reached Scheveningen, I could open my 
eyes. We ran through the narrow black lanes, 
and I turned my head on Gaspar’s shoulder, and 
saw, dark against the sky of night, the pointed 
spire of the church of Scheveningen. I, who had 
thought never to look up at the sky again, saw 
the church spire and knew we were almost home. 
From something Stephen said, I concluded that 
he had gagged and bound the soldier who had 
been burying me. 

“I would I had killed him ! ” muttered Stephen, 
savagely. 

But Gaspar sternly rebuked him, saying : 

“We Anabaptists do not count it Christ-like to 
kill men, even our enemies, and did I think it 
would save his life I would go back and help that 
soldier now.” 

But Stephen hastily assured Gaspar that cer- 
tainly the soldier had received no injury that 
could result in death, and Gaspar ran with me 
into our house, and gave me to Thyra’s care. 
For some days afterward I lay almost unable to 
move, but they were days wherein we all came to 
an agreement that we dared not stay longer in 
our present home. Not even for the sake of try- 
ing further to discover the fate of my father and 
mother, and Gaspar thought we would all better 
go to England. 


CHAPTER XIII 


CAPTURED 

I MMEDIATELY after this agreement, however, 
I was taken with a long attack of fever, brought 
on by my fright and exhaustion during the night 
of my burial. I was ill for several months, and 
during that time we were hidden in another house, 
for we feared lest soldiers from the Hague should 
track me to our house in Scheveningen. The 
two other women, who were taken prisoners at 
the time when I was, had not been dwellers in 
Scheveningen, but in the Hague itself, and we 
had not been able to discover what was done with 
them. 

1537 It ,was winter and a new year before I 
had recovered strength sufficiently to leave 
Scheveningen, though Caspar and I were married 
a little before that by an Anabaptist minister who 
was under sentence of death at the stake, if he 
could be found. Inasmuch as my cousin Stephen 
dared not risk his life by becoming an Anabaptist, 
though he believed us to be right according to the 
precepts of the New Testament, he could not gain 
Thyra. She was firm in declaring that she would 
flee with Caspar and me rather than accept the 
home that Stephen and his mother would gladly 

i88 


CAPTURED 


189 

have given her on board their boat. Yet even I 
myself urged her not to decide hastily, for I knew 
how truly she loved Stephen, and I feared she 
would find being parted from him a greater trial 
than she anticipated. And who knew whether 
she would ever see him again. But she was most 
decided. 

“ I have not chosen hastily,” she told me, her 
voice quivering. “ I will not marry a man who 
stands a coward before the duty that he believes 
God’s word commands him to perform. Bditha, 
these are times when death is better than life, if 
life must be purchased by cowardice. If Stephen 
loves his life better than he does the Bord, he is no 
fit man for me.” 

Caspar intended that he and Thyra and I 
should go to England, but, being almost discov- 
ered and captured in the attempt, we fled in ter- 
ror to the shores of the Zuyder Zee. Our next 
three years were spent in fleeing from one place 
to another; sometimes in winter skating, under 
cover of the fog, from the pursuit of the enemies 
of the Anabaptists. Sometimes we stayed in one 
place as long as six months, and then a new dan- 
ger would confront us, and we would fly again. 
So three years passed — three years in which Ana- 
baptists prayed to God for the coming of religious 
freedom. 

It was on the day our little boy. Hen- 1540 
drick, was one year old that we heard of the 
arrival in the Bow Countries of the emperor, 


IN editha’s days 


190 

Charles V. The coming of the emperor was 
the beginning of the renewal of the grievous 
persecutions against the heretics ” ; but chiefly 
against the Anabaptists, for it was our sect which 
was most persecuted at this time. Several severe 
edicts were issued against Anabaptist persons and 
writings. 

Always, through these three years of wander- 
ing, we had been minded to go to England, espe- 
cially after we heard that, in 1536, King Henry 
had ordered that the English people should be 
allowed to have the Bible in their own tongue. 

“It is wonderful; it is wonderful,’^ I said to 
Gaspar. “ Can it be true, or is it only wild news 
come across the sea?” 

We did not know whether to believe it or not ; 
it seemed so strange a thing for King Henry to 
do after fighting the New Testament so fiercely. 
But while we wondered whether we dared go to 
England, I one day met a woman who told me 
that the year before this fourteen Hollanders who 
had fled to England were there accused of being 
Anabaptists and were put to death, and ten others 
only saved themselves by recanting. Moreover, 
we heard that in the Articles of Religion set forth 
in England the sect of the Anabaptists was men- 
tioned and condemned. There was certainly no 
religious liberty in England. 

“It will not be safe for us to go there,” Gaspar 
concluded. 

So we stayed, fleeing from one place to another, 


CAPTURED 


I91 

as I have said, and enduring such hardships that 
again we thought of going to England ; but again, 
1 539) heard that an injunction had been 
issued there against those who held the opinions 
of the Anabaptists or possessed their books. And 
that same year too, there came fleeing from Eng- 
land sixteen men and fifteen women who had been 
banished for opposing infant baptism. 

“Suppose we had gone to England and then 
been sent back to the Eow Countries,” we thought 
when we saw this poor company. 

So we stayed; and the next year, as I have 
said, the emperor, Charles V., came to the Eow 
Countries, and the persecutions that the Anabap- 
tists had to endure grew more fierce than before. 

Caspar and Thyra, little Hendrick and I, at this 
time had our home and place of refuge in the 
lower part of an old windmill, in a somewhat 
lonely country spot outside of Delft, for we gradu- 
ally turned in our wanderings, and came back 
toward the direction from which we had first 
started. I had wished to go toward that portion 
of the Eow Countries again, if we ever thought 
we could dare do so, for I was anxious to see if 
in any way I could obtain word of Stephen and 
my aunt. We had not heard from them once in 
all our wanderings, and I suspected that Stephen, 
who had of course known that at first we had in- 
tended going to Norwich, in England, had never 
heard of our failing to escape thither. So, possi- 
bly, Stephen might have afterward left the Eow 


192 


IN editha’s days 


Countries and gone back to England bimself with 
his mother, thinking to find us there. I knew 
that had been Stephen’s intention, if we went, 
and I was sure he must have lost track of us, 
for he would not have been willing to give up 
Thyra so easily. Perhaps he had heard how 
nearly we were discovered the night of our at- 
tempt to flee to England. Perhaps he thought 
that we had all been taken and killed at that 
time. It was possible that he had mourned us as 
dead. Whatever had been his thought, I was 
glad that our flight had led us this far toward the 
district in which Stephen and his mother had 
been wont to follow the canals. 

One afternoon. Gasper and I had been away 
from the windmill, he working and I getting some 
provisions from the Market at Delft. I was to 
meet him at a certain spot outside the city, and 
we were to go home together. 

After I was past the rampart and the moat of 
Delft, however, I was greatly startled. Among a 
number of people who were passing, I came face 
to face with him who had been one of the monks 
at my old home of Caversham in England! I 
shrank instantly with the fear of detection, but I 
almost as immediately recollected that he could 
hardly know me. I had changed and grown up 
since then, and his eyes had not seemed to show 
the slightest recognition as we passed each other. 
It was over in an instant, but I had received such 
a shock that I could feel myself tremble. 


CAPTURED 


193 


“ He could not have known me ! I kept as- 
suring myself. “ In this dress, and grown older 
as I am, he could not have known me ! ” 

My hands shook and I shivered. Cold chills 
crept over me. After I was out of sight of people, 
I ran. Caspar was waiting for me at our ap- 
pointed spot, and we hastened home to the wind- 
mill. Once securely shut in there behind the 
stout door with its bars, Thyra, Caspar, and little 
Hendrick with me, I felt more safe. I knew 
King Henry had had spies on the continent, but 
no one would have any motive for tracing a poor, 
insignificant person like me. Not even a priest, 
baffled by my father’s safe escape from England, 
would be likely to trace me here. 

I told Casper and Thyra of the English monk, 
and they agreed with me that there was no 
danger, especially as the priest had not known 
which way I went. And yet, so near had I come 
to danger, that I was haunted by the thought 
of it. 

How had we dared come so near this pleasant 
city of Delft ? Did I not remember hearing that 
the Reformation had made a stir there, and that 
ten years ago a painter on glass, named David Joris, 
who afterward turned to the Anabaptists, had ob- 
structed a Catholic procession, and, as a punish- 
ishment, was whipped, imprisoned, and had his 
tongue bored. It was horrible to think of. And 
that had happened in Delft, the city so near us ! 
And Joris’ own mother had had her head cut off 
N 


194 


IN editha’s days 


in Delft, three years before! Why had I not 
thought more of these things ? 

A terror struck me, and then I resolutely tried 
to be brave. 

“We came here because we thought it more 
safe than to stay where we were,” I said to my- 
self. “We are in the hands of God. There is no 
safe place for an Anabaptist in all the Tow Coun- 
tries. At least, I know of none. This windmill 
is as safe as any place. If our enemies discover 
us we cannot help it. I will leave it all in God’s 
hand. If it is his will to take us quickly to 
heaven by the sword or by fire, his will be done. 
He has kept us alive hitherto. Our lives are his.” 

So I quieted myself. 

“I will not talk more to Gaspar and Thyra 
about it,” I resolved. “ I am foolish to be wor- 
ried. The priest did not know me.” 

I hushed Hendrick to sleep. Gaspar had lain 
down to rest early, for he was tired. He had 
worked hard. 

Hours after the three others were asleep I lay 
awake listening to the rustle of the windmill 
overhead. I softly raised myself on my elbow, 
and strained my nerves to hearken. The low rus- 
tle of the windmill continued. I could hear little 
Hendrick’s soft breathing, and I thought how 
dear he was to me and what a comfort. Tong I 
leaned there listening, hardly breathing myself, 
listening to every sound. My elbow tiring with 
the strain, I lay softly down again and drew be- 


CAPTURED 195 

neatli tlie covering, for the old windmill was cold 
at times. 

A drowsiness came upon me ; I slept awhile 
and then awoke. 

“We are safe,’’ I thought; “no evil has be- 
fallen us.” 

Again I raised myself on my elbow, and leaned 
and listened to the windmill’s sails. The world 
seemed peaceful. Why had I been afraid ? 

There was the sudden sound of a swift, awful 
blow on the door of the windmill. I sprang up, 
my heart beating swiftly. I trembled so that I 
could hardly stand. Blow on blow fell upon the 
door. The walls were of stone, but the stout door 
of wood. Gaspar had sprung up. A form hur- 
ried to us through the dark, and Tliyra caught 
hold of my hand, without a word. 

Blow after blow! We could hear the angry 
voices of men, cursing in Spanish, and high over 
all there came the piercing sound of an English 
voice : “ Kill them ! Kill them 1 Anabaptists 1 
Heretics ! Accursed of God 1 Kill them ! Kill 
them 1 ” 

The voice rose into a spasm of fury. The old 
door was stout. The blows rained down. 

“ Kill them I Kill them I ” shrieked the Eng- 
lish voice, wild with rage. “ Ah, that is right ! 
The door breaks, does it not? Harder! They 
are there ! They are there ! Ah, it is not so easy 
to escape ! We shall have them soon. Harder ! ” 

Who should shriek in English at such a time ? 


IN editha’s days 


196 

Dutch or Spanish was what we were wont to hear. 
I could not recognize the voice, but my heart mis- 
gave me that the monk of Caversham stood out- 
side the door. 

“ Anabaptists ! Heretics ! Miinsterites ! ” 

Yells and shrieks assailed us. The door was 
evidently giving way, stoutly barred as it had 
been. There was one window in the windmill, 
and thither we climbed to look out. It was on 
the other side from the door. By the wavering 
flame of torches, and by scanty moonlight, we saw 
a number of Spanish soldiers guarding a com- 
pany of prisoners. In front of them, stood the 
man who shrieked in English. He waved his 
hands in excitement. His voice came more clearly 
to my ears. 

“ Anabaptists ! Anabaptists ! Accursed ! Ac- 
cursed ! Accursed ! ” 

But no flash from any torch made his face clear 
to me. 

A sound of splintered wood. We could not see 
the door, or the soldiers there. 

“If I had but a rope,” groaned Caspar, “per- 
haps in the darkness I could let you down un- 
seen. Oh, my Editha ! my Editha ! That you 
should fall into the hands of yonder men ! ” 

He sprang away from the window, and tore 
some of the rough bedding into strips. Soon he 
was beside me, knotting the strips together. His 
breath came hurriedly, and he and I tugged at the 
knots to see if they were strong enough. 


CAPTURED 


197 


“ Now ! ” he whispered. “ Now ! ” 

There was a wild outcry of triumph below. 

“ Quick ! ” whispered Gaspar. 

He had tied the rope around me. Thyra 
handed up the baby, wrapped in his covering, and 
still sleeping. 

“ Kill them ! Kill them ! ” shrieked that 
English voice of madness. 

Gaspar tried to help me out of the window. 
The ground seemed so far below. I wondered if 
the rope was strong enough. Gaspar let me down 
swiftly and carefully. I was half-way down. I 
could hear the shouts and the blows on the other 
side of the windmill. I was two-thirds down. 

“ Anabaptists ! Anabaptists ! Miinsterites ! ” 

My feet were on the ground. With despairing 
fingers I pulled at the knot where Gaspar had 
fastened me to the rope. Would it never come 
undone? Would those people see me ? 

I slipped out of the rope at last. It passed up- 
ward out of sight, and I crouched close to the 
windmill’s side, and held my baby to my heart. 

The staunch old door ! If it could but hold out 
a little longer. The sound of splintered wood 
again. Thyra came flying down beside me. She 
loosed herself from the rope, and we waited. 

There was a crash. A succession of crashes. 
The sound of wood that broke and fell, the shout 
of men who rushed inside the windmill, the par- 
tial vision of a man who shot down the rope and 
dropped beside me. It was Gaspar. 


198 


IN kditha’s days 


“ Keep on this side of the windmill,” he whis- 
pered. 

He snatched baby Hendrick, and we ran. 

Inside the windmill there were shouts and yells. 

“ Kill them ! Kill them ! Kill them ! ” 
screamed the English voice. 

Hendrick began to cry, disturbed in his sleep. 

Gaspar hushed the child, and we ran. Oh, we 
were going to escape ! After all, the English 
monk would be baffled. Nobody would be found 
in the old windmill. We were to escape with our 
lives and our New Testaments. For, night and 
day I always carried mine with me, and I was 
sure that Gaspar and Thyra had theirs. I would 
not have wished to lose my English Testament, 
though now I could read Dutch easily. 

Alas ! What was that outcry behind us ? 

“ There they go ! There they go ! ” came the 
scream of the English monk. “ There ! There ! ” 

He was after us, himself and six of the soldiers. 

“ Come this way,” panted Gaspar, and Thyra 
and I ran in the direction he went. Hendrick, 
thoroughly aroused, began to cry loudly, not- 
withstanding all Gaspar’s efforts. The child cried 
for me, and I was forced to take him, lest his 
outcries should surely discover us to our pur- 
suers. 

We fled on. The soldiers gained upon us. 
The English priest was left far behind. Oh, 
could we run no faster ? Here they came ! 
Nearer! Nearer! I was so exhausted that I 


CAPTURED 199 

almost fell. Caspar half carried me as we sped 
on. The soldiers were upon us. 

We w^re taken. Driven headlong with blows, 
we were hurried back to the windmill. The Eng- 
lish monk and the soldiery greeted us with shouts 
of derision, and we were added to the number of 
other prisoners inside the guarding band. There 
were about thirty of our fellow-prisoners, men, 
women, and children, and I judged from the Eng- 
lish monk’s remarks that we were all Anabaptists. 

The soldiery formed a ring about us, and began 
to discuss what would better be done. Should 
the prisoners be immediately butchered, or should 
we be reserved for some other doom ? There was 
a long wrangle. 

“Was not your father he who hid in a fagot 
pile in Caversham in England?” savagely in- 
quired the English monk, turning to me. 

He knew me then ! I was silent. 

“ She is Dutch,” interposed a Spanish soldier. 
“All Dutch do not talk English.” 

“ She is English,” affirmed the monk, with a 
fierce frown. 

But the voice of the leader of the soldiery rang 
out commanding the prisoners to march. 

We rose. My baby Hendrick kept his arms 
around my neck. 

“ Let me carry him,” whispered Caspar. 

But the baby clung to me. 

“Co on. Anabaptists,” scornfully cried a soldier, 
aiming a blow at Caspar. “ Co on ! We will take 


200 IN KDITHA’S days 

you to a place where you shall fare worse than in 
a windmill.” 

“That may well be,” answered Caspar calmly. 
“ But know you, that the religious freedom which 
the Anabaptists ask will come some day to all the 
Tow Countries despite the Emperor Charles, great 
as he is. It will come, for it is God’s decree. Be- 
ware, lest you be found to fight against God.” 

The Spanish soldier perhaps not understanding 
all that my husband said, for Caspar had spoken 
in Dutch, merely made the sign of the cross, and 
muttered an imprecation against heretics, but 
another of our captors, evidently understanding 
more perfectly, shrieked, “ Freedom ! We will 
teach you what freedom means.” 

And Caspar was silent, knowing that to say 
anything was useless. But an Anabaptist woman 
beside me munnured in my ear as we were driven 
on : “ Your husband speaks truly. There will be 
religious freedom some day, whether we live to 
see it or not. God hears the prayers of the Ana- 
baptists.” 

Caspar managed to reach my side once more. 
The baby had grown very heavy. 

“ Let me carry him,” again whispered Caspar. 

But Hendrick clung to me. Oh, my baby, 
my baby ! To think it was the last time your 
arms clasped my neck ! 

The soldiers drove us on a long way, through 
the half-lit dark, mocking us with shouts, cursing 
us, threatening us with torture, with burning, 


CAPTURED 


201 


with beheading, with a living burial, with drown- 
ing, all in the name of the emperor. 

We had stumbled on for several hours. I was 
growing so weary that I could hardly carry Hen- 
drick who kept wide awake, his bright eyes fixed 
on the lights and the men, and his soft, warm 
little arms clinging around my neck. I was so 
tired that I wavered in my walk, but Hendrick 
would not willingly go to Thyra and I dared not 
force him to do so, for fear of what would happen 
if he should cry. My boy ! I am so thankful that 
I held him those last few minutes. 

We had come near a canal, when one of the 
brutal soldiers sprang forward to me. 

“Give me the child,” he roughly commanded 
in Dutch. 

“No,” I answered. 

I shook my head, and clasped my boy tightly, 
for a dreadful fear shot through me. 

But the soldier’s fierce hands tore the child from 
me. Hendrick screamed and the soldier struck 
him. I sprang to the man and snatched at my 
boy, but the soldier knocked me down. His 
sneering voice arose. 

“ See, see,” he mocked. “ See me play the 
priest ! Anabaptists, I can baptize a child. See ! ” 

And before I could gain my feet, the soldier had 
thrown Hendrick far out in the canal. There was 
a cry from the child, a splash in the water. 

My boy ! my baby boy ! He was gone. I shrieked 
and plunged through the soldiers, but they caught 


203 


IN editha’s days 


me and drove me back. I saw Caspar struggle 
like a madman with the men who held him. 

It was all over. Not another cry came from 
the canal. The flickering lights showed no ripple 
on the far surface of the water. 

The English monk laughed. Such a laugh! 
I think devils must laugh like that. 


CHAPTER XIV 


IN PRISON 

D O you know what it is to live in prison 1550 
for ten years? Do you know how long 
ten years can be? Do you know what it is to see 
the jailer come and throw you scanty food, and 
jeer at you, and taunt you with your helpless- 
ness ? Do you know what it is to have the execu- 
tioner come at midnight and choose one of your 
number for torture? Do you know what that 
means when the one chosen is your husband? 
Do you know what it is to lie awake the rest 
of the night praying in unutterable agony to 
God that your husband might not recant under 
torture ? Do you know what it is to be glad to see 
him brought back alive though in agony? Do 
you know what it is to thank God that your 
own child is dead, because you have seen another 
woman’s child whipped to death ? 

Oh, Antwerp ! Antwerp ! would that we could 
have found refuge within you from the power of 
our enemies. For to you, Charles V., fearing lest, 
rich and powerful and splendid city that you 
were, you would be ruined, granted some mercy. 
And yet, oh, Antwerp ! Antwerp ! before the dread- 
ful years of persecutions for the Anabaptists were 

203 


204 


IN EDITH A’S days 


over, liow many, many hundreds of the poor mar- 
tyrs were to perish in your city. And still, at one 
time, just before our escape, we had wished that 
we could have been in Antwerp. 

I will pass over those prison years. Condemned 
to perpetual confinement, several of our company 
died before the first year had passed. The second 
year six of us died ; the third year five more. 
Once in a while we heard through some new pris- 
oner how it fared with our Anabaptist brethren 
in the outer world. 

And sad things we heard. One prisoner who 
came to us in the fifth year of our imprisonment, 
told us that at Rotterdam, the year before, a com- 
pany of Anabaptists had been holding a meeting in 
a house when a woman came to the house pro- 
fessedly to borrow a kettle. She had this only as 
an excuse, however, for she was a spy, and she be- 
trayed the Anabaptist company into the hands of 
the enemy. Fine business it was for a woman to 
be in. The poor Anabaptists were tortured and 
would not recant. So the men were beheaded by 
the sword, and the women were put into a boat, 
and, it being cold enough so that the water was 
frozen over, the boat was thrust under the ice till 
the women were drowned. 

I questioned Caspar. “ Does it look as if the 
Anabaptists in spite of their wishing for religious 
freedom for all men, will ever gain it ? What are 
we doing toward bringing religious freedom to 
the world ? 


IN PRISON 


205 


And Caspar always uncomplaining, answered 
patiently : Wait, Bditha. The emperor is sworn 
to uphold the pope and the church of Rome. 
But God rules above the emperor. I will tell you 
what the Anabaptists are doing toward bringing 
religious freedom — they are praying. They are 
praying that that day of freedom may come. 
Sometimes when I lie awake I seem to see their 
prayers mingling with the smoke of burning 
martyrs in a great cloud going up from this coun- 
try to God. Ours go up from the prison cells, and 
mingle with the prayers of those Anabaptists 
whose bodies lie drowned in river, or stand where 
they were buried alive. Wait, Editha, the Ana- 
baptists are praying for religious freedom. Is 
prayer nothing? They are dying for religious 
freedom. Is martyrdom nothing? ” An old man 
one of our fellow-prisoners, repeated : “ The Ana- 
baptists are praying for freedom ! ” 

From another new prisoner who came to us one 
year we heard of the drowning of two Anabaptist 
women in sacks. Moreover we heard that through- 
out Flanders there had been great persecution, 
and that Charles V. had demanded that the Ana- 
baptists should be expelled from Friesland. And 
in 1549, we heard that there were in prison at 
Amsterdam about twenty Anabaptists who had 
been put there on account of their religion. 
Twelve of these prisoners, through some kind 
friends, escaped. A tailor, named Ellert Jansen, 
might also have escaped, but he was lame, and 


206 


IN editha’s days 


thought he would easily be retaken, so he stayed 
with the others in prison, and they were all burnt 
to death in March, five men and three women, 
according to their sentence: “For that they had 
suffered themselves to be re-baptized, and had 
wrong notions of the sacraments.’’ But, as Ellert 
Jansen was being led to his death he cried out : 
“ This is the most joyful day in my whole life ! ” 
1551 We prisoners sometimes felt as if death 
A.D. were preferable to imprisonment for life. 
But when a little more than ten years had gone 
by, after the year 1551 had come, before the ice 
had left the canals, one very foggy night a daugh- 
ter of a jailer, who had secretly made friends of 
Thyra and me, contrived that Gaspar and we 
should escape. With fear and trembling she let 
us out, giving us skates and bidding us under 
cover of the fog to flee away as swiftly as possible. 
The girl had furnished us with food and a little 
money, and noiselessly we vanished in the dark- 
ness. 

I could hardly skate, we had been so long im- 
prisoned. I thought, as we shot on, of those 
skaters and those boats of Scheveningen that used 
to fly past the old treckschuyt^ when my father 
and mother and I lived there. But those days 
were gone. Nothing but intolerance seemed to 
remain for the Eow Countries. And yet, oh how 
we Anabaptists had prayed that religious freedom 
might come ! 

On we fled, side by side. The fog closed around 




In Editha’s Days 


Skating for Liberty. 


Page 207, 



IN PRISON 


207 


US and hid us from any other persons who might 
be abroad at night. We listened fearfully for any 
outcry behind us, but all was still. We skated 
through all the hours of the night, pausing to rest 
now and then, taking a little to eat, then skating 
on through the fog, not knowing whither we went, 
save that we would leave our prison far enough 
away ; and we were sure, as long as we kept to 
the canals, that we would not lose our direction, 
and wander around in a circle back again to the 
enemies we had left, whatever new ones might 
appear. 

Faintly through the fog in one place there 
loomed up before us the outline of a treckschtiyt 
hemmed in by the ice. lyiving persons were near 
us. It was almost morning. We were affrighted, 
and yet we did not know where we were going. 
We were so weary, Thyra and I, that we could 
hardly go farther, for this was unwonted exercise 
for us after our prison life. 

As we stood resting a moment, hidden by the 
fog we hoped from all observing eyes, we heard 
a man’s voice singing. Two or three other voices 
joined him. It was a Dutch version of one of the 
Psalms, I thought. The singing was very soft 
indeed, so faint that if we had not been so near 
the treckschuyt we could not have heard it. 

“They are at morning prayers,” whispered 
Thyra. 

At least we suspected the people on board the 
treckschuyt were not Catholics. But, if Protest- 


2o8 


IN EDITHA’S days 


ants, they might be our enemies. Anabaptists 
must not be sure of friends. 

Thyra, haggard with sleeplessness from anxiety, 
looked at me. I saw the exhaustion in her face. 

“ The fog will lift, perhaps, when the sun rises,” 
I said to Gaspar, “ and we shall be left to hide as 
we can. Shall we not go to this treckschuyt? ” 

If we had not been in such desperate straits we 
would have hesitated more, but we were all too 
exhausted to go farther. 

We approached the treckschuyt. Gaspar climbed 
on board, warning us to fly immediately if we 
heard any tumult or outcry. But it was not more 
than a moment before he was back again with 
two other men. 

“Editha,” he whispered, “the Eord has led us 
to Anabaptist friends. And oh, Editha, Menno 
Simons is on board this treckschuyt?'' 

Oh, such a thrill of gladness as filled my heart 
at that news ! For Menno Simons was the com- 
forter of the Anabaptists in those dark days. How 
he traveled, pursued by danger, speaking to the 
Anabaptists, comforting, strengthening them ! He 
it was whom God raised up for our aid, else had 
some of us almost dwelt in darkness. 

We were hurried into one of the compartments 
of the treckschuyt., and there we found the little 
company assembled. All greeted us with great 
affection, and we were warmed, and fed, and com- 
forted by sympathy. Ah! sympathy is so dear 
when one has been in prison ten years. 


IN PRISON 


209 


“ Unto you it has been given to suffer for our 
Lord’s sake,” said Menno Simons, “Blessed be 
the Lord that he gives us such grace.” 

Menno Simons had known what it is to be a 
worldly, dark-minded priest of the Romish church, 
yet not without some tenderness and piety. But, 

^53^) ^3-^ been led to search the New Testa- 

ment in order to find out the truth about the 
Lord’s Supper. Afterward he was led, by the kill- 
ing of that poor Anabaptist tailor, Sicke Snijder, 
to examine the New Testament in regard to bap- 
tism. You remember that the Anabaptist, Sicke 
Snijder, was executed with the sword, his body 
laid on a wheel, and his head set on a stake in 
Friesland, a short time after we came to the Low 
Countries. 

Menno Simons was priest at his native place, 
Witmarsum, in Friesland, from 1531 to 1536, but 
during several of those years, he was trying to 
suppress his convictions that the Anabaptists were 
right. He knew that if he left the church of 
Rome and became an Anabaptist he would receive 
hatred and suffering. But one thing is especially 
noteworthy in his case, as showing how surely a 
frank study of the New Testament will lead to 
belief in immersion after repentance and faith in 
Christ, and will also lead to the rejection of infant 
baptism. Menno Simons never spoke to any Ana- 
baptist persons about baptism till after he had be- 
come sure himself from reading the New Testa- 
ment that they were right. 

o 


210 


IN kditha’s days 


Menno Simons himself told Caspar and me of 
his struggle before he came out from the Romish 
church. 

“ I besought my God with sighing and tears,” 
said he, “ that to me, a troubled sinner, he would 
grant the gift of his grace ; that he would endue 
me with wisdom, spirit, frankness, and manly for- 
titude, so that I might preach his worthy name 
and holy word unadulterated, and proclaim his 
truth to his praise. 

“At length the great and gracious I^ord, per- 
haps after the course of nine months, extended to 
me his fatherly spirit, help, and mighty hand, so 
that I freely abandoned at once my character, 
honor, and fame which I had among men, also my 
anti-Christian abominations, mass, infant baptism, 
loose and careless life, and all, and put myself 
willingly in all trouble and poverty under the 
pressing cross of Christ my lyord.” 

Menno Simons told Caspar moreover : “ By the 
gracious favor of God I have acquired my knowl- 
edge, as well of baptism as of the lyord’s Supper, 
through the enlightening of the Holy Spirit, 
attendant on my much reading and contemplating 
the Scripture, and not through the efforts and 
means of seducing sects, as I am accused.” 

It was the lath of January, 1536, the year be- 
fore Caspar and Thyra and I fled from Scheven- 
ingen, that Menno Simons bravely resigned and 
left the Roman Catholic church. He began to 
preach secretly to those brethren who came around 


IN PRISON 


211 

him. But the Inquisition had its eyes on Menno 
Simons. He did not preach so secretly that the 
Inquisition could not discover what he was doing. 

But he was such a comfort to God’s people. 
He traveled hither and thither, always persecuted, 
always in danger, but preaching and bringing 
many to the truth. It was well that he came to 
comfort the Low Country Anabaptists when he 
did, for to how many scattered and oppressed 
communities did his eloquent words and powerful 
religious writings prove a blessing ! He held up 
our faith. He had left ease and plenty for flight 
and suffering. He was our brother in tribulation, 
and his words brought us good cheer. 

On this treckchuyt^ he and his wife, as well as 
we, were refugees. After we had been made com- 
fortable, and after Thyra, who was nearly ex- 
hausted, had lain down in the other compartment 
to sleep, Caspar and I tried to learn from the 
other Anabaptists in hiding all we could of what 
had gone on in the world since we were impris- 
oned. For you cannot think what it is to be shut 
off from the world and have it go on so long with- 
out you, and then come out into it again. 

“ We want to flee to Norwich in England, if we 
can escape the Inquisition,” Caspar said. “ How 
does King Henry treat those who are not Roman 
Catholics ? Does he allow people to read the Bible 
now? We heard a rumor once that he did.” 

There was a solemn silence in the little com- 
pany. One person looked at another. 


213 


IN editha’s days 


“You see,” commented one old man, “ wliat it 
is to be in prison so long.” 

“ King Kenry?” repeated the old man, turning 
to Gaspar. “ It makes no difference now in Eng- 
land whether King Henry likes the Bible or not. 
Four years ago King Henry went to stand before 
God.” 

Gaspar and I both started. 

“ Is King Henry dead ? ” I asked. 

The little company assured us it was so. 

“And who reigns now?” we inquired, breath- 
lessly. 

“A young king, Edward,” answered the old 
man. “He is but fourteen years old. Heaven 
grant he become a better man than was his father. 
Yes ; he allows the people to read the Bible.” 

Gaspar and I looked at one another. 

“We will go to England,” we declared. “We 
will go to England.” 

“If the Inquisition does not seize you before 
escaping from the Eow Countries,” warned one 
sad-faced woman. “ We all intend to flee to Eng- 
land, but so many of us are taken before arriving 
there. And even there an Anabaptist has not 
much home.” 

Now all these years had I cherished a hope in 
my heart that my Cousin Stephen and my aunt 
had gone back to England at the time we tried to 
flee thither, and it seemed to me that it would be 
so great and wonderful a joy to find them again, 
though I could not hope that Stephen had waited 


IN PRISON 


213 


all these years for Thyra, whom he must regard 
as dead. Probably he had married, after the man- 
ner of men. Yet a wonderful joy thrilled through 
me at the mere thought of seeing one of my own 
kin again. 

But at the words of this woman my joy was 
tinged with anxiety. The Inquisition did hold 
sway. Was it at all probable that we could escape 
from this country? 

We fell to discussing what the Inquisition had 
already done. We knew the treckschuyt might be 
invaded, and we might all be arrested at any 
moment. Menno Simons told us of two excellent 
men named Kelken and Fye, Anabaptists of the 
town of Olde Boor, in West Friesland. These 
men, two years before this, had been apprehended 
and brought to the magistrates. Sentence was 
pronounced. Belken was beheaded. Fye was to 
be burned. The constable said : “I have in my 
life seen many a heretic, but never a more obsti- 
nate one than this.” Fye was strangled and then 
burnt, but the common people cried out : “ That 
was a pious man. If he was not a Christian there 
is not one in the whole world.” 

Moreover, Menno Simons told us of a good 
Anabaptist, Hans of Overdam, who had been put 
to death at Ghent with Hans Keeskooper during 
the last year. The council had asked the prison- 
ers why they were not satisfied with the faith of 
their parents and with their baptism. Their reply 
was : “ We know of no infant baptism ; but of a 


214 IN editha’s days 

baptism upon faith, which God’s word teacheth 
us.” There was much discussion, and a monk be- 
came so angry that he cried out, “ Simpletons ! 
Simpletons ! Heretics ! Ye are heretics ! ” Hans 
of Overdam, before his martyrdom, wrote a letter 
giving an account of his imprisonment, saying in 
one place : “ Eleven of us were taken into a dark, 
deep vault. In the vault were built many dark 
cells of masonry. There we were all put, three 
and three ; but Hansken and I were placed in the 
darkest of all, in which was a little dirty straw, as 
much as might be carried in one’s lap.” When 
the prisoners had been on the way to the castle 
whither they were first taken, Hans and his fellow- 
prisoner had been fastened together with iron 
bands, their thumbs being also fastened together. 
This letter, which Hans of Overdam requested 
should be forwarded to Friesland, wishing that 
his words might reach the church at Embden, 
contained also these words: “Written in prison 
for the testimony of Christ. In this dark dungeon 
I have lain a month. I now lie in a deep, round 
dungeon, which is somewhat lighter, and in which 
I have written this letter.” So afterward did this 
good man and his friend die at the stake. 

“And while such things go on,” indignantly 
added one of the men hiding with us on board 
the treckschuyt, “ the Emperor Charles has ordered 
the inquisitors ‘ to make it known that they are 
not doing their own work, but that of Christ, and 
to persuade all persons of the fact.’ It would 


IN PRISON 215 

be bard work to persuade me of that, I can tell 
you.” 

“ If the Ivord Christ himself should appear in 
human form in this country, who can doubt that 
he would be seized and crucified again or burned 
alive by the order of the emperor ? ” asked one of 
the woman, adding : “ The emperor puts to death 
those who try to follow Christ most closely.” 

“ Be of good cheer,” gently answered Menno 
Simons ; “ the God of religious freedom yet reigns. 
Let us pray to him to deliver all men from tyr- 
anny.” 

And then he prayed. Such a prayer ! Full of 
pity for our persecutors who thought, some of 
them, that they did God service ; full of sympathy 
for the sufferings of our fellow-brethren ; a peti- 
tion that God would send religious freedom to all 
men. One after another of the company prayed. 
Always that request ran through the prayers, that 
God would send religious freedom. Freedom ! 
Freedom to read God’s word, and to obey it. 
Freedom not for us only, but for all men. 

And yet our little prayer meeting would have 
been considered a heinous thing, had the Emperor 
Charles known of it. Had he not forbidden all 
reading of the Scriptures, all discussion within 
one’s own house of religious matters ? He would 
no more tolerate freedom than, a few years after 
this, would Viglius van Aytta van Zuichem, he 
who was a member of the State council under 
Margaret, and president of the council of Mechlin. 


2i6 


IN EDITHA’S days 


“If every man,” said Viglius, “is to believe 
what be likes in bis own bouse, we shall bave 
beartb gods and tutelar divinities again, tbe 
country will swarm witb a thousand errors and 
sects, and very few there will be, I fear, who will 
allow themselves to be enclosed in tbe sheepfold 
of Christ. I have ever considered this opinion the 
most pernicious of all. They who hold it have a 
contempt for all religion, and are neither more nor 
less than atheists. This vague, fireside liberty 
should be by every possible means extirpated ; 
therefore did Christ institute shepherds to drive 
his wandering sheep back into the fold of the true 
church ; thus only can we guard the lambs against 
the ravening wolves and prevent their being car- 
ried away from the flock of Christ to the flock of 
Belial. I^iberty of religion or of conscience, as 
they call it, ought never to be tolerated.” 

Yet it was this “ fireside liberty ” for all men for 
which we Anabaptists worked and prayed. We 
would give up our lives before we would give up 
our right to freedom of conscience. 

Several of our little company of Anabaptists 
purposed trying to reach Antwerp, where the In- 
quisition had less power. The night following 
our coming to the treckschuyt was foggy also, and 
several of our new Anabaptist friends bade us fare- 
well and started for Antwerp. Alas ! if they 
reached that city I know not whether they found 
safety there, for it was in September of this same 
year that two Anabaptists, we heard, were mar- 


IN PRISON 


217 


tyred at the stake at Antwerp ; and the wife of one 
was taken to the river Scheldt, pnt into a sack and 
drowned. So Anabaptists were not safe in Antwerp, 
though the Inquisition did not rage there as else- 
where. 

We stayed on board the treckschuyt yet 
another day ; and then the next night, accom- 
panied by the prayers of our new friends, Gaspar 
and Thyra and I set out on our journey to the 
coast to see if we might find any means of leaving 
the I/)w Countries for England. In our skating 
before, we had unwittingly been going away from 
the coast, instead of toward it. 

In spite of all that I knew was against our un- 
dertaking, I could not help feeling glad, and pic- 
turing to myself our joyfully reaching Norwich 
and our finding my relatives there. It was only 
a vision of what might never be, and yet it put 
new strength into me as I skated on, my old New 
Testament hidden about me. For, through the 
years of confinement, I had contrived to conceal 
my New Testament and keep it, although Cas- 
par’s Dutch Testament had been speedily discov- 
ered and taken from him, and Thyra’s had been 
found, after a time, and taken from her. 

By dint of much hiding and traveling by night, 
we at length reached the seacoast. Ah, that 
North Sea with its gray sky and continual uproar ! 
How many memories came back to me, as I 
looked out on the water again ! 

We are on the edge of freedom,” I thought, 


2i8 


IN editha’s days 


and I remembered bow among tbe yellow dunes 
beside the farther stretches of this sea, Gaspar 
years ago had asked me to be his wife and had 
asked me to go with him to England. If we had 
gone then, would it have ' been better with us 
now? At least, my baby’s curly head would 
never have sunk beneath the waters of a canal of 
the Low Countries. 

There were dunes all along the coast, and Gas- 
par thought that we might find more safety travel- 
ing and living among the sand dunes than 
elsewhere. It was one day when we were hidden 
among these dunes that we saw a thing dreadful 
to view. 

It was afternoon. The breeze from the water 
was in our faces. Thyra slept. Gasper and I 
watched, lest an enemy should surprise us. Gas- 
par came sliding down from the top of a sand 
dune. 

“ There approach men across the dunes ! ” he 
warned, and I hastily woke Thyra. 

Before long we heard voices, as the company of 
men passed by our range of sand dunes. A 
woman’s voice in Dutch, repeated the words of 
John 3 : i6 : 

“ Want alzoo lief heeft God de wereld gehad^ 
dat Hij zijnen eeniggeboren Zoon gegeven heeft^ 
opdat een iegelijk^ die m Hem gelooft^ niet ver- 
derve^ maar het eeiiwige leven hebbe^ 

And a man’s voice, loud aud terrible, replied : 
“Anabaptist, what know you of the Scriptures? 


IN PRISON 219 

Have you then read them ? So much the more 
ought you to die ! Anabaptist ! Heretic ! ” 

They passed on, and, afraid as we were of dis- 
covery, we could not forbear creeping up a sand 
dune’s top, and watching what came to pass. The 
men took the girl, — for she was only a young 
girl who was thus doomed, — to the edge of the 
sea where the surf came rushing in with great and 
angry force. We could not hear what was said, 
but we feared for the young Anabaptist. She 
seemed to have no friends with her in this her 
hour of need, and she knew nothing of our sympa- 
thizing eyes. 

“Oh!” cried Thyra, clasping her hands in 
horror. 

The men had driven the girl into the sea. One 
of the soldiers dealt her a most savage blow on 
the head, and she fell forward into the foaming 
water. Horror-stricken, we watched the body 
float out, sometimes visible, sometimes obscured 
by the dashing waves. She lay on her back, and 
floated. 

“ She must be dead,” whispered Gaspar, after 
we had watched some time. “If she had been 
breathing she would have choked with water and 
have sunk before now. But she floats I I think 
that blow from the soldier must have killed her.” 

The soldiers who had finished their work with 
certainty, as they apparently thought, went away 
through the sand dunes. We watched the men 
disappear and reappear between the ranges. The 


22,0 IN EDITHA’S days 

soldiers were gone at last. The body of the girl 
still floated. 

We hurried down on the sands as near as we 
dared. Caspar looked at the surf. 

“ I must see if she is dead ! Possibly she may 
be alive even yet,” he said ; and cold winter day 
as it was, pulled off his outer garments and 
plunged into the surf. 

He swam toward the body, battling with the 
waves that threatened to overwhelm him. But, 
though he swam as a wonted flsherman, yet the 
strength of the surf was such that he could not 
come near enough to the girl to grasp her. He 
would swim almost to her, and then the waves 
would bear him away again. Once he was so 
near that he thought the next wave would bring 
her to him, but instead of that the wave floated 
her farther away. 

By this time he was quite sure she was dead ; 
yet, if he could have brought her body to shore 
he would have done so, in order that we might 
give her decent burial in the sands. But he was 
compelled to give up at last and swim for the 
shore, feeling that his strength was failing in that 
sea. Thyra and I, who had been greatly alarmed 
for him, watched him striving through the waves. 
We ran down to their edge and pulled him in. 
He was almost exhausted, but we did all we could 
for him. After he was half buried in the sand 
on the side of a dune away from the wind, we 
turned our attention again to the drowned girl. 


IN PRISON 


221 


For about two hours Thyra and I watched the 
body of the girl floating, floating, always on her 
back. At last the waves brought her to a place 
where there seemed to be a kind of an eddy in the 
water. We lost sight of her an instant, and then 
she reappeared, but the eddy had turned her over, 
so that she lay upon her face a moment. And 
then she began slowly to disappear. 

“ Oh, she is going down ! ” exclaimed Thyra. 

Little by little the girl sank, till finally her long 
hair spread out upon the water, and that was the 
last we saw of her as she went down. 

Thyra drew a great breath. We watched a few 
moments, but the murdered girl did not reappear 
on the water. 

‘‘ She is gone ! ” I whispered. 

In the wind and the rain of the following night 
we traveled as far as possible among the dunes. 
And when next day I slept, hidden in the sand, I 
dreamed I saw the body of that young Christian 
girl floating upon the waves. 


CHAPTER XV 


ESCAPE TO ENGLAND 


RAVEEING along the coast as swiftly as pos- 



^ sible, we at length reached the vicinity of 
Scheveningen. Out on the sand dunes, a night’s 
walk from the village, we were startled and made 
horribly afraid by finding a long pole, and hang- 
ing from the top, a dead man, swaying a little in 
the wind. His head hung heavily drooping for- 
ward ; one arm swung helplessly. He was bound 
to the pole with ropes. His was a ghastly figure ; 
some long, torn portion of his raiment was swing- 
ing down from his shoulder ; ropes were about his 
neck and his drooping shoulders, his knees, and one 
ankle. One hand was tied to his side, the other 
arm as I said was swaying, and his head, as far 
as we could judge in the uncertain light, had been 
partly crushed by a heavy stone or instrument. 
His ghastly form seemed almost to come to life 
before our eyes ; the effect doubtless of the mov- 
ing arm and swaying portion of his attire. 

He had evidently been dead for days, although 
at first thinking him alive from his motion, we 
had spoken to him. But we spoke to the dead. 
We hurried past, feeling that the sand dunes were 
well known to our enemies. We could not doubt 


222 


ESCAPE TO ENGLAND 


223 


that he who hung there had been slain on account 
of his religion. I looked back fearfully, and saw 
him swaying, a dark, startling form, fading out 
against the gray sky. 

“ If we hasten we may reach Scheveningen be- 
fore day,” said Gaspar. 

“Will anyone remember us?” asked Thyra. 
“Will any one take us in? ” 

Nevertheless, when we saw the fishing boats of 
Scheveningen drawn up on the beach as of old, 
and when we saw the church-spire dark above the 
dunes, we cried out for joy, and ran over the sands. 
We reached the city at last, though it seemed as 
if sand dune after sand dune would intervene. 
We hastened up a narrow lane and hid ourselves. 
Finally we ventured to a house that we had once 
known. Despite the years of prison-life, the fisher- 
woman knew us, and took us in immediately. 

And here, for the first, I heard news of Stephen. 
The woman remembered him and his mother, and 
assured us that they had without doubt gone to 
England soon after the time of our flight. 

“ And you, have you been there and been ban- 
ished ? ” she asked. 

We told her the story of our wanderings, and 
she was pitiful, but doubted whether we three 
could leave the Eow Countries unperceived. 

“ The eyes of the Inquisitors and of your ene- 
mies are quick to see,” she whispered. 

“ Their eyes may be holden that they may not 
know us,” answered Gaspar, undismayed. 


224 


IN editha’s days 


And so did lie encourage me by bis words, that 
I said to Thyra when we were alone together, “ I 
think we shall see England and Stephen before 
long.’’ 

But Thyra only threw herself into my arms, 
and wept as if she would never be done. And I 
could not comfort her, knowing right well that 
Stephen must count her as dead, and if he had 
wedded another, it was but human and manlike 
that he should have done so. Moreover, she had 
definitely refused him, because he would not dare 
to follow his highest convictions. Yet I, who am 
a woman and know a woman’s heart, pitied my 
sister Thyra, notwithstanding she said never a 
word why she wept. 

But though we tried continually to find passage 
1551 to England, so fearful were we of discovery 
A.D. by our enemies, it was not till September 
that we effected our escape. 

It was a gray, dark September night when we 
and a man, who also said that he wished to go to 
England, went out of Scheveningen. We had 
much hope that a vessel of which we had heard 
would bear us to the land we sought. The vessel 
was to lie by for us at a certain point, which we 
were to reach in a small boat. 

We had come to the outermost edge of the 
dunes in safety, when out of the night and the 
sands four men appeared and pursued us. We 
succeeded in escaping them in the darkness, but 
we were so driven out of our course that we hardly 


ESCAPE TO ENGLAND 


225 


knew wliat to do. The man who was with us, 
named Johannes, had professed to us that he was 
an Anabaptist also. But I began to doubt him, 
for while we fled from our pursuers, I thought I 
had heard him call back something that seemed 
as if he were in league with them. Yet he had 
continued running with us, and now stood beside 
us thanking God that we had escaped. I knew 
not what to think. 

After a time we ventured back to the place 
where our small boat had been secreted. Findinof 
no one to oppose us, we entered the boat and 
pushed off, hidden by the darkness. 

When we had rowed a distance, the man Jo- 
hannes suddenly sprang to his feet, struck Gaspar 
a violent blow with an oar, and attempted to throw 
him overboard. The men grappled fiercely in the 
darkness. The waves were tossing the boat, and 
swayed by the struggles of the men, it careened 
from one side to the other, till it seemed as though 
it would capsize. Thyra and I grasped Johannes, 
trying to keep him from dealing Gaspar such 
blows, but we were little against the hypocrite’s 
strength. He was furious, having evidently thought 
his power sufficient to overcome Gaspar without 
difficulty. But my husband, despite his prison 
experiences, still retained much of the strength 
with which he had formerly faced the North Sea. 

Johannes dealt Gaspar a mighty blow, and half 
pushed him overboard. Another instant, and the 
hypocrite’s purpose would be achieved. But Gas- 


226 


IN EDITHA’S days 


par, recovering himself, smote Johannes, and im- 
mediately the boat capsized, and we were all 
thrown into the sea. 

There was an awful interval of struggling to 
catch hold of the boat. I grasped it, and looked 
around. The night and the waves hid all. I 
heard a voice beside me, Caspar’s voice, though 
what he said the waves dashed from me. 

“ Thyra ! ” I screamed, striving to pierce the 
dark with my eyes. 

Had she gone down? And where was Johannes 
the traitor? 

“ Caspar!” cried a faint voice through the wash 
of waves. 

We shouted back. 

“ I am safe 1 ” cried Thyra. “ I have caught an 
oar. I can swim.” 

She came closer. 

But where was Johannes? 

We called aloud, but the waves only answered 
us. We clung to the boat and drifted, calling till 
we felt we must not lose our strength shouting. J o- 
hannes had returned no cry. Yet I felt as if any 
instant he might seize and try to drown me. 

We floated and swam, holding the boat till after 
being in the water for more than an hour, we suc- 
ceeded in reaching the shore quite a distance be- 
yond Scheveningen. Here we righted the boat, 
and drew it on the sands. All our provisions and 
little possessions had sunk when the boat was 
overturned. Everything we had provided was 


ESCAPE TO ENGLAND 227 

gone. We lay on the sands exhausted. Already 
midnight must be past. The vessel on which we 
were to sail was to wait for us, if necessary till 
near morning, but no longer. 

Caspar sat up. 

“ I must return to Scheveningen and find help,” 
he murmured. “ I am too weak to row to the 
ship.” 

With that he fell back on the sand and an- 
swered no more, though I spoke to him. In 
alarm, Thyra and I tried to lift him, but his head 
hung back helplessly. His heart beat still. Oh, 
how I longed for light that I might see his face ! 
If, when he was in the water, he had swooned 
like this, what should we have done ? 

I could not comprehend why he did not revive 
now. But daylight came faintly at last, and then 
Thyra and I cried out, for it was blood as well as 
water, that made his left sleeve wet. Pulling 
bare his arm, I found a knife-eut, not deep indeed, 
but bleeding yet. 

“ That traitor, Johannes, had a knife,” groaned 
Thyra, as we bound the arm. 

After a while Caspar revived enough to tell us 
that we must reach Scheveningen before morning. 
He tried to walk, though he was still so weak that 
we supported him as well as we could. We were 
obliged to stop often for rest, but continued, till 
by the time morning fully came, we had reached 
Scheveningen and found shelter with our kind 
friend. 


228 


IN KDITHA’S days 


Now whether Johannes, the traitor, struck on 
his own knife when the boat capsized, or whether 
he went down among those waves, I cannot tell, 
but I know that, during our stay of ten days after 
this in Scheveningen, that man who had pre- 
tended to be an Anabaptist was never seen. After 
ten days we went forth again, two of the Scheven- 
ingen fishermen being with us, and lying in the 
bottom of the fishing-boat, concealed by an old 
sail, we were brought by our friends to a ship that 
was to bear us to England. 

But I have never doubted that Johannes was 
one of those informers whom Charles V., in his 
edict of 1550, encouraged to betray heretics into 
the hands of the inquisitors. It is true we had 
almost no goods, with the possession of which 
Johannes might have been rewarded for his 
treachery ; but perhaps he looked for reward else- 
where if he could but take us prisoners. It was 
doubtless his intention also to reveal to our ene- 
mies the name of the kind friend who sheltered 
us in Scheveningen. The edict had forbidden 
any one to lodge a heretic, or furnish him with 
food, fire, or clothing. But I have little doubt 
that the waves of the North Sea covered both 
Johannes and his evil purposes. 

Tossing in our ship, we thanked God for his 
protection in the past. It seemed wonderful that 
we were really out of the Eow Countries at last ; 
and even in the waves of this sea there was a feel- 
ing of security. The God who had kept us 


ESCAPE TO ENGLAND 


229 


through so many perils owned this ocean, held us 
and it in the hollow of his hand, and could bring 
us unto our desired haven, no matter what the 
will of our enemies might be. 

One day my husband came to me with beaming 
face. 

“ Kditha,” he said, eagerly. “ I have a Dutch 
Testament again.” 

In the ship on which we were, we had found 
numerous fleeing Anabaptists. It was from 
one of these men that Gaspar had obtained 
his Testament ; and I was very thankful he could 
do so, for English Testaments might be more 
numerous in England than Dutch ones, and there 
is nothing like one’s own home tongue. Incred- 
ible as it might seem, considering the experiences 
through which we had passed, I still had my old, 
worn English Testament, though surely I would 
have lost it before this had I not always made a 
practice of carrying the book concealed inside my 
dress. Stained with sea-water and faded with 
much reading, that New Testament was dearer to 
me than any newer copy that England might 
hold, for my old book seemed the only link left 
to bind me to the days when my father and my 
mother were alive. 

But oh, when the shores of England came in 
sight, what a weeping arose among us all ! Many 
wept for joy, crying out that the land of religious 
freedom was before us. One Anabaptist, a cripple 
through the tortures inflicted and whose wife had 


230 


IN EDITHA’S days 


been buried alive in the land we left, sobbed aloud 
and blessed the young boy, King Edward, who 
allowed his subjects to read the word. But Ana- 
baptists might perhaps not be welcome for all that. 
Most of us were bound for Norwich, which 
another King Edward had once made the home 
of many persons from the Eow Countries, and 
where we were to hear that England was not such 
a land of religious freedom after all. 

Yet England, to many of those who wept, did 
not mean what it did to me. It was my home- 
land. And were Stephen and my aunt still in 
Norwich? That had not been a place without 
its martyrdom for conscience’ sake, and Gaspar 
and I talked of Thomas Bilney who years before 
this had, after recanting and suffering greatly in 
spirit because of that recantation, obtained grace 
of God and coming to Norwich preached in the 
fields, confessing his past weakness and warning 
all men “ to beware by him, and never to trust to 
their fleshly friends in matters of religion.” He 
gave one of Tyndale’s New Testaments to a con- 
verted nun, was arrested, put into prison, and 
afterward burned. 

I thought of Thomas Bilney when at last our 
weary journey ended and our company entered 
into the old town of Norwich. Would other 
flames for other martyrs ever blaze in these 
fields? Would Anabaptists be safe in England? 
It was a solemn question to us, for we had just 
heard that though Bible reading had been re- 


escape; to kngeand 


231 


stored, yet it must be that King Edward was 
against the Anabaptists, for when he had issued 
his general pardon in the end of December of the 
year before he had not included the Anabaptists. 
That did not look like safety or like religious 
toleration. 

Yet Gaspar and Thyra and I found temporary 
shelter and set ourselves to weaving with great 
diligence, hoping that peace might be granted to 
us. We heard nothing of Stephen or my aunt. 

One day Thyra came in with a face so white 
that on my glancing up from my weaving I asked 
her what the matter was. She made me but little 
answer, and I was busy and did not question. 
After a few days I began to notice that whenever 
we were out in the street and some of the black- 
robed Benedictine friars of the place went by, or 
whenever one such monk passed our home, Thyra 
would look earnestly as if she half thought to see 
some one. But I did not understand till one 
day, in a narrow, winding street, I came face to 
face with a thin, weary-looking Benedictine friar, 
whose black robe only added to his sorrowful ap- 
pearance. 

“ Stephen ! Stephen ! ” I cried, springing forward. 

I could not but know him, though as I gazed 
the resemblance seemed to fade. He looked at 
me with hollow eyes that dropped their lids be- 
fore the recognition in my face. 

“ I am Brother Barnabas,” he murmured, draw* 
ing his black garments about him. 


2^Z IN EDITHA’S days 

I could see him tremble. He stepped forward 
as if to pass me. I caught a fold of his black 
garb. 

“You are Stephen, my cousin Stephen!’’ I 
asserted. “Where is my aunt? Why are you a 
monk? ” 

The slight black figure bent its head and stood 
quivering. 

“ My mother is with the dead,” he replied at 
last. “ When I returned to England I became a 
monk at my mother’s earnest request. I am 
Brother Barnabas. If you are risen from the dead 
to break my heart with past memories, let me tell 
you a monk has no heart. Let me pass.” 

But I clung to his black robe. 

“ You are Stephen, Stephen my cousin,” I re- 
peated ; “ Stephen who used to go with me to see 
the one-winged angel ; Stephen who used to listen 
with me to my aunt’s tales of the saints ; Stephen 
who fled with us and who lived with us on the 
treckschuyt and learned to read the New Testa- 
ment ; Stephen who believed the Anabaptists to 
be right and yet dared not risk his life by be- 
coming one of that hated sect ; Stephen, whom 
Thyra ” 

A groan broke from the figure beside me. His 
face was muffled in his black robe. A monk has 
no heart ? 

“Oh, Editha, Editha ! ” groaned his voice. “If 
she had lived ” 

“ She has,” I answered sternly. “ Thyra and 


ESCAPE TO ENGLAND 


233 


Caspar and I are alive. All those persons who 
follow God’s word and their consciences do not 
die, whatever men’s threats may be. You might 
have been an Anabaptist, and yet be more alive 
than you seem.” 

I spoke plainly, for my heart was hot when I 
thought of his cowardice and that he had not 
even given me a fitting greeting after all these 
years of separation. 

But I forgave him everything, for he fell at my 
feet, and broke into such sobbing that if the 
narrow little street had not been a somewhat 
unused one, we would have attracted attention. 
It was not “ Brother Barnabas ” who knelt at my 
feet. It was my cousin Stephen, whose sorrows 
I had often soothed when we were children. Yet 
I made no effort to comfort him now. Though he 
should weep long his tears could not efface the 
years of loneliness that Thyra had endured be- 
cause of his cowardice, nor could efface the years 
in which, to please his mother, he had lived a life 
that he must have known to be a false one. 

And yet, as I looked upon him sobbing there, I 
thought that at least the Romish church had done 
one thing. Stephen was a monk, and therefore 
unmarried. Yet what availed that now? . Was it 
likely that this weak man had courage now to be- 
come an Anabaptist, after being bound more 
tightly than ever to the church of his mother’s 
faith? And Thyra — had she seen him in this 
Benedictine garb ? 


234 


IN editha’s days 


Stephen rose to liis feet. 

“I am brother Barnabas,” he said, brokenly. 
“The past is over. I am a monk. My dying 
mother charged me to remain one, no matter how 
England’s religion might change.” 

And with a swift sign of the cross, he went 
away from me so quickly that I could not stay 
him. 

I did not know whether to tell Thyra or not. 
But I told Gaspar, and one evening he brought 
Brother Barnabas home to us. By what persua- 
sion my husband did so, I know not, neither do I 
know what Thyra said to Stephen, for my husband 
and I left them to speak to each other as they 
would. But this I know that, nevermore was 
Brother Barnabas seen to wear the garb of the 
Benedictine monks of Norwich. 

There was a stir among the monks for a time, 
and we thought it advisable for Stephen to hide 
from them. But this was a Protestant land under 
King Edward’s power, and men who would have 
burned Stephen under another ruler, now felt it 
wise to appear favorable themselves toward Pro- 
testantism. But Protestantism is not Anabaptism, 
and I feared for my cousin’s life after he was bap- 
tized. For he did become an Anabaptist, great as 
was the danger, and I think he truly repented of 
the manner in which he had allowed his mother 
to sway his conscience. Yet I cannot deny that 
my cousin was a weak man, though a Christian, 
and I was glad the day when I saw Thyra married 


ESCAPE TO ENGLAND 


235 


to him, for I trusted that her strong faith and be- 
lief would uphold him, and that he would, like 
many another man, be built up in the gospel by 
his wife’s influence. 

Yet, for fear of any revenge from the Benedictine 
friars, Stephen and his wife left us for a time, 
and went to Sandwich to live, thinking it more 
safe. 

So Gaspar and I were left alone, but not for very 
long. God gave to us another baby boy. And 
when I kissed our little one, I could not keep from 
weeping, for I remembered his brother’s curly 
head and the warm baby arms that had encircled 
my neck before the Spanish soldier snatched my 
darling from me. Yet my little Hendrick was in 
heaven, safe with my father and my mother, I be- 
lieved. We named this boy Bliezer, because of 
the meaning of that word, “to whom God is 
help.” 

“ If the child finds life such a thing as his father 
and mother have found it, he will have need of 
God’s help,” said Gaspar, reverently and uncom- 
plainingly. “We will teach the little lad where 
real help comes from in dark days. And we will 
teach him also to pray with us for religious free- 
dom.” 

I think I never saw a father love a child more 
than Gaspar loved this little English boy of ours. 
We hoped for peaceful days under King Edward, 
for we said to each other that when our young 
king grew older, he would see for himself that the 


IN bditha’s days 


236 

Anabaptists were bis loyal subjects, and would 
treat us as kindly as the other Protestants. 

1553 But when our little Eliezer was six months 
old, a great blow was given to our hopes, and 
we were thrown into a greatly unsettled state, not 
knowing what should befall us. Our sixteen-years- 
old king, Edward, died. During his reign the 
images had been removed from the churches, the 
articles known as the “Bloody Statute” had been 
repealed, and the Reformation progressed in Eng- 
land. Would such things be, under whomsoever 
came after him ? 

Lady Jane Gray, poor woman, reigned ten days. 
Then Mary, daughter of Henry VIII., was set on 
the throne, and she caused Eadyjane Gray and 
her husband to be beheaded. Alas, for the throne 
that is grasped by a bloody hand ! 

Already we heard murmurings that our new 
1553 queen was a Catholic. In August we were 
sure that a reaction had taken place in the 
government. Gardiner was made lord chancellor 
the 23d of August. He and that English prelate, 
Bonner, who afterward showed himself so great a 
persecutor of the Protestants, were at the head of 
the government. 

I could see that Gaspar thought trouble at hand. 
Mary was not like her half-brother, Edward. 
Even during his reign. Anabaptists had been 
burned. We heard, little by little, much that 
showed us that Mary was a firm Papist. She had 
been persuaded to let King Edward’s body be 


escape; to ENGLAND 237 

buried by Craniner with tlie Bnglisb service, but 
the same day had a requiem mass sung in I^atin 
in the Tower, Gardiner wearing a mitre and per- 
forming the mass in the old popish form. 

Moreover, we heard that toward the end of Au- 
gust Bishop Bonner restored the old service in 
St. Paul’s church in London, there being proces- 
sions of priests, and mass was also in Latin. We 
learned too, that there was sc great revival of Cath- 
olic doings among the Oxford folk, and we heard 
rumors of Catholic rejoicing and plotting against 
the Protestants. But worse was yet to come. We 
lived through that winter in a state of suspense. 
The next summer a thing happened that crushed 
all hope. Queen Mary was married to that deadly 
foe of Anabaptists, Philip II. , the son of that em- 
peror whose dreadful power we had felt in the 
Low Countries, Charles V., of Spain. 

“ Oh, Gaspar,” I cried ; “ the Spanish power 
will rule in England. We shall have the Inqui- 
sition here as it was in the Low Countries. Oh, 
I never thought that Spain would reach across the 
the sea. Woe unto us Anabaptists! We shall 
never see religious freedom in England.” 

But Gaspar, though he laid his hand on little 
Eliezer’s head as if to keep the child from harm, 
answered steadily: “The Inquisition will not 
come to England. The English people hate the 
Spanish alliance too much for that.” 

Yet soon after Mary’s marriage, persecution be- 
gan more fiercely ; and when November saw the 


IN editha’s days 


^38 

declaration by Cardinal Pole that England and 
Rome were reconciled, and when, in February, 
John Rogers was burned, we prepared ourselves 
1555 for the worst. I was greatly alarmed for 
Stephen and Thyra, from whom we had not 
heard for a long time. Surely now the monks 
would feel that they might take vengeance on the 
recreant Brother Barnabas. 

But when I thought of John Rogers’ death by 
fire, he being the first man to die thus under the 
new queen’s reign, I remembered something that 
Rogers had said when Edward was king. ‘A 
Baptist woman, named Joan Boucher, of high 
parentage, who had been accustomed to secretly 
bring copies of Tyndale’s New Testament into 
King Henry’s court was after a while taken pris- 
oner for heresy. Those who examined her, re- 
ported to the young king that they had decreed 
her separation from the Ford’s flock as a diseased 
sheep. Yet a time passed before sentence was 
pronounced. Ridley, and Cranmer, and Fatinier, 
good men though they were, afterward bravely 
undergoing death during Queen Mary’s reign, yet 
did not believe in allowing freedom of thought 
and j udgment about the Scriptures. And so at last 
the council issued a warrant to the lord chancellor 
to make out a writ for Joan Boucher’s execution. 

Poor young King Edward did not want to give 
his signature to a document authorizing the kill- 
ing of this woman. But Cranmer is said to have 
urged him to sign the document. 


KSCAPE TO ENGLAND 


239 


King Edward hesitated. 

Cranmer said that by the law of Moses blas- 
phemers were to be stoned to death; and this 
woman was guilty of impiety in the sight of God, 
impiety that a prince, as God’s deputy, ought to 
punish. 

The poor young king, evidently thinking Cran- 
mer believed that Joan Boucher was not a Chris- 
tian, asked a solemn question : “My lord, will you 
send her soul to hell ? ” 

King Edward at last was compelled to yield, 
but he said : “ If it be an error you, my lord, shall 
answer it to God.” 

So weeping. King Edward signed the docu- 
ment. 

John Rogers too thought that Joan Boucher 
ought to be put to death, and when some one said 
that it was cruel, Rogers stated that burning alive 
was “ no cruel death, but easy enough.” 

So Joan Boucher, the Baptist, was burned at 
the stake in May, 1550, and when in February, 
1555) under Queen Mary’s rule, John Rogers him- 
self was burned at the stake, I wondered if he still 
thought that burning alive was “ no cruel death, 
but easy enough.” 

Yet I do not doubt that Rogers, and Cranmer, 
and Ridley, and Eatimer, were Christian men, and 
that they thought they did God service by burn- 
ing Joan Boucher, though I think that when they 
met her afterward in heaven they probably be- . 
lieved more in religious freedom than when on 


240 


IN kditha’s days 


earth ! It seemed that the Anabaptists were the 
only people in those days who did believe in re- 
ligious freedom for all men. The Catholics wished 
religious freedom for themselves and the Protest- 
ants for themselves, but both denied it to the 
Anabaptists. It was generally known that there 
were a great many Anabaptists in the kingdom. 
What would our new Queen Mary do ? 

What would she do, she who believed and 
obeyed Rome so scrupulously that she had put 
off her coronation till she had received from Gran- 
vella. Bishop of Arras, the oil to be used in the 
ceremony? She was afraid that, owing to the 
estrangement that had existed between England 
and Rome, the English oil might have lost its 
virtue. But Philip, whom she married the year 
after her coronation, as I have before said, had 
something else to do besides introduce the Inqui- 
sition into England. In the autumn of this same 
year of his marriage, his father, Charles V., re- 
signed the crown to him, and he was left to strug- 
gle with the problem of quelling Protestantism and 
stamping out all Anabaptism in the Eow Coun- 
tries. A goodly problem that was, but Philip 
perhaps thought he could solve it. 

“ Better not reign at all,” he was wont to say, 
“ than reign over heretics.” 

One thing puzzled us. A Spanish friar, Alfonso 
de Castro, who was Philip’s confessor, preached a 
sermon immediately after the first martyrs were 
burnt at Smithfield, England. The friar spoke 


escape; to ENGLAND 


241 


bitterly against sucb burnings. He denounced 
them as contrary to the spirit of Christianity, 
which is charity and forgiveness, and which 
teaches its ministers not to take vengeance on 
the sinner, but to enlighten him as to his errors, 
and bring him to repentance. 

Now we knew not what to think, for we could 
hardly believe that the Spanish friar would dare 
speak this way without Philip’s permission, and 
yet we did not believe, judging from the conduct 
of Philip’s father, and from what we knew about 
Philip himself, that he was so very much shocked 
by those Smithfield burnings. The burning of 
heretics in England could not shock him so much 
more than the burning of them in Spain. And so 
we concluded that perhaps Philip, seeing that 
many people in England were shocked by the mar- 
tyrdoms, thought that he would free himself from 
any suspicion in regard to them, and so induced 
his confessor to preach that sermon. 

However it was, Caspar and I, notwithstanding 
many alarms, stayed quietly in Norwich, for the 
period of Queen Mary’s reign, always on the 
alert, always knowing that before nightfall of any 
day we might be imprisoned and condemned. 
Our queen’s reign seemed drenched in blood. 
What would it matter to her if Caspar and I were 
added to the list of victims? We were only 
Anabaptists. 

But in spite of the cruelties of her reign, I can- 
not doubt that Mary was sincere in her religious 
Q 


242 


IN editha’s days 


professions. She was always ready to sacrifice 
her own interests whenever she thought that the 
interests of what she believed to be religion de- 
manded it. She persisted in restoring the Catho- 
lic church property, which in the past had been 
confiscated to the use of the crown. 

Mary’s ministers remonstrated. 

“ The crown is too impoverished to admit of 
it,” stated they, when they knew her plan of re- 
linquishing that portion of her revenue. 

“I would rather lose ten crowns,” answered 
Mary, “ than place my soul in peril.” 

So does Rome deceive the heart and blind the 
eyes of the one who is taught of her. 

And still, through these years of blood, the 
Baptists of England, miscalled Anabaptists, prayed 
God to sond religious liberty. It seemed at times 
as if our prayers were all forgotten. And the Ana- 
baptists of the Low Countries were praying too. 
Were all our prayers to be unanswered? Ah, the 
God of religious freedom was treasuring up those 
prayers. In his time he would answer his suffer- 
ing people. 


CHAPTER XVI 


DARK DAYS 

“ "PDITHA,” said Caspar one night, “1 1555 

J-' had word from Stephen to-day.’’ 

“What said he?” I asked quickly, for my 
thoughts were ever with Stephen and Thyra now, 
knowing what peril the ex-monk and his wife 
might be in. 

“ He thinks he must flee from England,” went 
on Caspar. “ He and Thyra are closely concealed 
at Sandwich, and he beseeches us to come with 
all speed, if we would see them again.” 

“Let us go,” I answered hastily. 

“Moreover,” continued Caspar in a low tone, 
“ I was warned to-day that we are in danger our- 
selves.” 

“Let us go,” I repeated. “Remember Richard 
Woodman.” 

“I remember he said that he praised Cod be- 
cause he was as a sheep appointed to be slain,” re- 
plied Caspar. 

“So might we rejoice, if we were taken,” I re- 
sponded. “But perhaps we may escape.” 

And we made ready that night our things, I 
thinking all the time how dear a place a home is, 
and wondering if we should ever have one again. 

243 


244 


IN EDITHA’S days 


But I remembered bim who had no place to lay 
his head, and was comforted. 

I remembered, moreover, what the Baptist 
martyr, Richard Woodman, had said : ‘‘For as 
Christ hath given his life for us, so ought we to 
give our lives for the defense of the gospel and 
comfort of our brethren.” 

And lest you should not know who Richard 
Woodman was, I will say that he was an iron- 
monger of Warbleton, in Sussex, in which county 
he was martyred for conscience’ sake. 

And because Sussex is next to Kent, in the 
eastern part of which, at Sandwich, were Thyra 
and Stephen, we felt the more concern. It would 
seem as though Queen Mary persecuted most in 
the eastern part of England. And what could an 
Anabaptist do for the cause of religious freedom 
but plead for soul-liberty, and die ? 

This Richard Woodman, the Baptist iron- 
monger, had for a curate or minister of the par- 
ish a man who, in the days of our king, Edward 
VI., when Protestantism, but not religious liberty, 
held sway, had outwardly been a Protestant. But 
as soon as the Catholic Queen Mary came to the 
throne, the minister, whose name was Fairbanke, 
turned and became a Catholic, and taught the 
people the very opposite of that which he had be- 
fore preached. 

When Richard Woodman heard this teaching 
from his pastor’s lips, he could not help speaking 
about it. And on this, Richard Woodman was im- 


DARK DAYS 


245 


mediately arrested and put in prison for a year 
and a half. There was religious freedom for an 
Anabaptist! Then Woodman was sent to that 
memorable place, Bishop Bonner’s coal house, 
was examined and released, but was afterward 
unjustly arrested again, while ploughing. How- 
ever, he escaped and hid in the woods. Afterward 
he left England, but soon came back again, long- 
ing for his homeland. 

By the treachery of his brother and father. 
Woodman was arrested. He had various exami- 
nations. During one. Dr. Eangdale, the bishop of 
Chichester’s chaplain, asserted that if Woodman’s 
child had died before baptism it would have been 
eternally lost. 

“How think you?” asked Woodman. “Are 
all condemned who receive not the outward sign 
of baptism?” 

“Yea,” answered the doctor, “ that they be.” 

“How prove you that?” questioned Woodman, 
and Eangdale answered by repeating the Eord’s 
words promising eternal life to such as believe and 
are baptized, and condemnation to such as do not 
believe. 

“Then,” went on Woodman, “by your saying 
that baptism bringeth faith and all that are bap- 
tized in water shall be saved, shall they?” 

“Yea, that they shall,” returned the doctor; 
“ if they die before they come to discretion, they 
shall be saved, every one of them ; and all that be 
not baptized shall be damned, every one of them.” 


IN EDITHA’S days 


246 

Then Woodman, greatly aroused that a man 
should say anything so contrary to the word of 
God as that baptism should save one, cried out : 
“ How dare you speak such blasphemy against God 
and his word, as you do ? How dare you for your 
life take upon you to preach and teach the people 
and understand not what you say ? For I protest 
before God that you understand not the Script- 
ures, but as far as natural reason can compre- 
hend ; for if you did, you would be ashamed to 
speak as you do.” 

Woodman challenged Dr. Dangdale to prove his 
doctrine by Scripture, and the doctor turned pale 
and trembled. Then Woodman went on to show 
that Christ’s words foretell condemnation to those 
who believe not. 

Woodman, farther on in his examination, said 
to the doctor : “ But you say that if they are bap- 
tized with the water, if they die before they come 
to the years of discretion they are all saved ; the 
which St. Peter is clean against, unless you grant 
that children have faith before they are baptized. 
Now I ask you, what consent of conscience the 
children have, being infants ? For you say they 
believe not before they are baptized ; therefore, 
then, they consent not to be baptized, because they 
believe not. And by this it followeth that none 
shall be saved, although they are baptized. I 
would fain see how you can answer this.” 

And Dangdale answered: “You are the most 
perverse man that ever I knew. You know not 


DARK DAYS 


247 


wliat you say. The children are baptized in their 
godfathers’ and godmothers’ faith, and that is the 
good conscience of which St Peter speaks.” 

So argued they till Tangdale began to stamp 
the floor, railing at Woodman. The examina- 
tion continued, and there were six examinations 
in all, to which Woodman was subjected. During 
the fifth examination the bishop of Winchester 
threatened any man who would be kind to Wood- 
man. There were more than three hundred peo- 
ple present at the examination, and the cruel 
bishop cried : “If any of you bid God strengthen 
him, or take him by the hand, or embrace him, or 
show him a cheerful countenance, you shall be 
excommunicated, and shall not be received again 
till you have done open penance ; and therefore 
beware of it.” 

This, I suppose, was spoken more particularly 
to the men of the bishop’s diocese. 

At the last examination the wicked bishop of 
Winchester said to the prisoner : “ Thou art a 
heretic, and therefore thou shalt be excommuni- 
cated.” 

Woodman denied being a heretic, but no cre- 
dence was given to his words. 

“And so,” wrote this Baptist after his last 
examination, while he was waiting his execution, 
“ he read forth the sentence in Latin, but what he 
said God knoweth, and not I. God be judge be- 
tween them and me. When he had done, I would 
have talked my mind to them, but they cried out. 


IN editha’s days 


248 

‘ Away, away with him ! ’ So I was carried to 
the Marshalsea again ; where I now am, and shall 
be, as long as it shall please God. And I praise 
God most heartily that ever he hath elected and 
predestinated me to come to so high a dignity as 
to bear rebuke for his name’s sake ; his name be 
praised therefore for ever and ever. Amen.” 

Richard Woodman was burned with nine other 
Christians, all in the same pile, four of the persons 
being women, one of whom was very old indeed. 
Time was not even allowed for a writ author- 
izing the burning to come down from Rondon to 
Lewes, in Sussex, where the martyrdom took 
place. Truly we were made to feel that England 
was no realm of religious liberty. 

But this we had known for some time. Only, 
after I had put together the things we must carry, 
and after we took ©ur little six-years-old boy and 
went forth into the world, fugitives again, I looked 
up at the sky and I thought of my baby Hen- 
drick. He was safe, safe from bloody Queen 
Mary and all her prelates. He was in a land of 
religious freedom. 

By as swift journeying as our feet could make 
— though it was slow enough, and all too slow to 
our hearts that far outstripped our footsteps — we 
came at last to the town of Sandwich, which lies, 
as is well known, on the coast of Kent upon the 
edge of the North Sea, and at the mouth of the 
river Stour. 

Our hearts misgave t;s lest we should be fog 


DARK DAYS 


249 


late, and Stephen dared not have waited for our 
coming. But we found him and Thyra hidden in 
the house of a woman who feared God more than 
she feared our queen. And being received into 
the house and also hidden, we consulted what 
should be done. 

“Let us leave England,” advised Stephen. 
“Well I know the thoughts that lurk under a 
monk’s cowl. I am sure the friars will kill Thyra 
and me if we abide in England. Oh, Gaspar, will 
religious freedom never come to the earth? ” 

Stephen told of several attempts that had al- 
ready been made to take him. 

“ England is no safe place for an Anabaptist,” 
declared Thyra. “One may not even call one’s 
self by the right name, and say ‘ Baptist.’ ” 

Long and earnestly we talked that night, and 
Gaspar, with the sound of the North Sea lingering 
it would seem yet in his ears, yielded to Stephen’s 
importunity, and agreed to flee with them. 

“ If we could gain Germany,” suggested Ste- 
phen ; “ or if we could reach Moravia. ” 

Such were our plans ; but, alas ! when could 
fugitives choose their own ships, or their own 
ports? We waited, our friend’s husband try- 
ing, greatly at his own risk, to find among the 
vessels of Sandwich one that would take us on 
board. Finally he discovered a ship-master who 
would conceal us, but the ship was bound for 
Rotterdam. Must we try the Low Countries 
again ? Was England worse ? 


250 


IN editha’s days 


Perhaps we would have rejected the offer and 
stayed, at whatever risk, but that night there 
came men hunting through the town for Stephen. 
A monk directed the searchers, and they ran- 
sacked the place where Stephen and Thyra had 
lived, and with threats sought to discover whither 
“Brother Barnabas” had betaken himself. But 
us the monk and his helpers did not find. 

So, being sure that death was determined for 
Stephen, and being unwilling that we should be 
separated, the next night we committed ourselves 
to God’s care, and were hidden on board the ship 
for Rotterdam. And though Gaspar did not know 
what might come to us in the lyow Countries, yet 
to him it was going home to his native land, and 
he could not but feel glad that he was so soon to 
see once more the dykes and meres of Holland. 
Fisherman that he had once been, the dull weav- 
ing that had since been his English occupation 
had ill suited him, and the sea air and the sound 
of the water seemed to send a thrill of exhilara- 
tion through his soul. He and Stephen talked 
much of the manner in which they hoped to find 
their way from Rotterdam into Germany. 

“Oh,” sighed Stephen, “will the day never 
come when in all these fair countries there shall 
be religious freedom ? How happily might each 
of us serve God, if his neighbor would allow it ! 
Why is it that religious liberty is so high a doc- 
trine for men to attain to ? ” 

Gaspar smiled a little sadly. 


DARK DAYS 


251 


“Have patience with men, brother,” he re- 
joined. “Our lyord has taught us Anabaptists 
that it is right that no compulsion should be used 
in matters that concern a man’s conscience. But 
in all men there is not this knowledge. All men, 
though some may be learners of Jesus Christ, have 
not attained to the spiritual wisdom that the Ana- 
baptists hold in this matter. And therefore it 
behooves us, as we have received this truth, to 
impart it to others, and to valiantly argue with 
men for the right of religious freedom for all. ’ ’ 

“ I trow that no other people have so bravely 
stood for religious freedom as have the Anabap- 
tists,” answered Stephen. 

The first news we heard, on our arrival at Rot- 
terdam, was of the death of that emperor whose 
decrees had caused Anabaptists in the I^ow 
Countries so much persecution. Charles V. was 
dead ! He had died in the monastery of St. Yuste, 
in Spain. 

“ But Philip lives,” the shipmaster warned us. 
“ Think not that you can read your Bibles in 
peace. Did not the dead emperor forbid all read- 
ing of the Scriptures in the Netherlands? ” 

“ Should an Anabapti.st listen to such a com- 
mand ? ” returned Gaspar. “ Is it not the Anabap- 
tists who have helped to spread the Bible in the 
past ? ” 

“But Anabaptists must keep quiet now,” 
rejoined the shipmaster cautiously. “ Took you. 


252 IN EDITH A’S DAYS 

The emperor’s ears are dead, but his son’s — they 
listen.” 

Charles V., in the codicil to his will, conjured 
his son Philip most earnestly to follow up and 
bring to justice every heretic in his dominions, 
without showing any mercy to any one ; and also 
to cherish the Holy Inquisition as the best instru- 
ment for exterminating heretics. 

“So,” concluded Charles, “shall you have my 
blessing, and the Tord shall prosper all your 
undertakings.” 

After years were to tell how carefully Philip 
followed this advice. 

This year of his father’s death, Philip published 
an edict in Spain, borrowed from an edict in the 
Netherlands, condemning all who bought, sold, or 
read prohibited works, to be burned alive. The 
son was worthy of his father. 

But how terribly self-deceived Charles V. must 
have been. He left a testimony behind him that 
would make one think him a most devout Chris- 
tian, if one did not know his bloody deeds. This 
was the testimony: “I have tasted more satis- 
faction in my solitude in one day, than in all the 
triumphs of my former reign. The sincere study, 
profession, and practice of the Christian religion 
have in them such joys and sweetness as are sel- 
dom found in courts and grandeur.” 

And yet Charles adjured his son Philip to cher- 
ish the Holy Inquisition. Verily the depths of 
self-deception in a human soul are wonderful. 


DARK DAYS 


253 


For two days the funeral obsequies of the dead 
emperor were held at Brussels. A grand proces- 
sion swept through the streets. The most con- 
spicuous thing in the procession was a ship that 
seemed to float upon the waves. The masts, the 
shrouds, and the sails of the ship were black, and 
the ship was covered with banners and heraldic 
signs, in memory of Charles’ expeditions. And 
whom should the ship have for crew but Hope, 
Faith, and Charity. 

Hope, Faith, and Charity for him / For that 
emperor who had published the edicts in the 
Netherlands ; who had sent Inquisitors among us, 
and who at last, when about to die, had adjured 
his son Philip by his hope of salvation to deal to 
all heretics the extreme rigor of the law, ‘‘ with- 
out respect of persons and without regard to any 
plea in their favor.” 

On the second day of the obsequies. King 
Philip, dressed in mourning, went to the church 
where service was held, and Charles V. was sol- 
emnly announced to be dead. 

To bring to “justice” every heretic in the Low 
Countries, that was the determination of King 
Philip. And not only did he himself determine it, 
but he entered into a secret league with the 
French king, Henry H., that they would extermi- 
nate by fire and sword all Protestants in their 
realms. 

Now must I tell you, in this hour when the 
enemies of God were plotting to destroy every 


254 


IN EDITHA’S days 


one of us, how the Ivord raised us up help even, 
seemingly from our enemies. William the Silent, 
Prince of Orange, had been highly recommended 
to Philip II., our king, by his father, Charles V. 
And Philip seemed inclined to make use of the 
young man. William was sent, with the Duke of 
Alva, and two other persons, to France. The 
four were to be hostages sent by Spain, as a guar- 
anty for the fulfillment of a treaty. 

1559 While William was there, one day while 
hunting in the forest of Vincennes, very in- 
cautiously the French king, Henry II., probably 
supposing that so noted a young man had been 
told before of the secret league between him and 
the Spanish monarch, spoke to William of the 
plan to kill all the Protestants. William was 
horrified by the revelation, but knew better than 
to show his horror and surprise to Henry. 
William was silent. From that very hour his 
purpose was fixed. He felt what he would do. 
A little while afterward he came to the Dow 
Countries, and tried to excite the people against 
having the Spanish troops there. 

For William already felt, as he said, that “ an 
inquisition for the Netherlands had been resolved 
upon more cruel than that of Spain, since it 
would need but to look askance at an image to be 
cast in the flames.’’ And though William yet did 
not believe as the Protestants did, he said he 
could not “ but feel compassion for so many vir- 
tuous men and women thus devoted to massacre.” 


DARK DAYS 


255 


So William the Silent — thus called because he 
had kept still when the French king told of the 
purpose — determined to save these poor Chris- 
tians if he could. He, a Catholic, would save us. 

In one of the last talks that William had with 
Philip before leaving, the king had given him the 
names of several “excellent persons of the new 
religion,” and had commanded that they be put 
to death. I do not know who they were, but I do 
know that instead of killing them, William gave 
them warning so that they might escape. 

I have said that William was at this time a 
Catholic. When he was a little boy he was brought 
up in the lyiitheran faith, but Charles V., being 
displeased that the boy should be so taught about 
religion, obtained the consent of William’s pa- 
rents that he should be taken to Brussels to live in 
the family of the emperor’s sister. Regent Mary of 
Hungary. This, of course, was a Catholic fam- 
ily. William was only twelve years old when he 
went there. Who would have thought that God 
intended that in the future William should be the 
friend and defender of the Anabaptists, the cham- 
pion of religious liberty ? No one in that Catholic 
family surely. When William was fifteen years 
old he was made a page of Charles V. 

But when, in after days, William came to the 
Tow Countries with those names of “excellent 
persons suspected of the new religion,” I think 
that his religious ideas were, perhaps, unsettled. 
However, he knew he was sorry for the good peo- 


IN kditha’s days 


256 

pie in trouble, and believed in religious liberty 
enough to try to save them. One writer wrote of 
William at one time in his career : “ The Prince 
of Orange passed for a Catholic among Catholics, 
a L/Utheran among Lutherans. If he could he 
would have had a religion compounded of them 
both. In truth, he looked on the Christian re- 
ligion like the ceremonies which Numa the Roman 
introduced as a sort of politic invention.’’ 

But the man who wrote that was unfriendly to 
William. I know this, that the Prince of Orange 
believed in religious freedom, and condemned per- 
secution in matters of faith. He thought that all 
men ought to be free in such matters. It was so 
strange, so rare a thing to find any besides the 
Anabaptists who really believed in religious free- 
dom for all men, that I cannot but h^ve faith that 
God raised up William the Silent and sent him to 
the Low Countries to aid us in our great troubles. 
God was answering the prayers of the Anabap- 
tists for religious freedom for all. 

William was appointed governor of Holland, 
Zealand, Utretcht, and West Friesland, and he had 
been reminded that whereas some persons had im- 
agined the severity of the law “to be only in- 
tended against Anabaptists, on the contrary the 
edicts were to be enforced on Lutherans and all 
other sectaries without distinction.” 

This shows how cruelly the Anabaptists had 
been treated in the Low Countries. Alas, the 
cruelties were by no means over ! 


DARK DAYS 


257 


Margaret of Parma was made regent of the 
Netherlands about this time. She was the half- 
sister of King Philip, and we knew how Spanish 
hands had treated Anabaptists in the past. Still 
she was a woman not wholly of Spanish blood, 
and we hoped for what we might. But, oh, what 
terrors followed, and what a mistaken man had 
she in her State Council. The Frisian, Viglius 
van Aytta van Zuichem, was one of the Council. 
He was a learned man, and he thought that for a 
common person who was not learned in law or 
divinity to enter into his closet, to shut the door, 
and to secretly pray to God was to open wide the 
gate of destruction for all in the land, and to bring 
in the Father of Evil at once to fly away with the 
souls of all the people. 

None of us were to believe the contrary of the 
Catholic religion. The Regent Margaret was an 
enthusiastic Catholic. She had a greater horror 
of “ heretics ” than of any other sort of evil- 
doers, and she looked up to the bloody edicts of 
her father, Charles V., as if they had been special 
revelations from heaven. 

Viglius, that member of Margaret’s State 
Council whom I have mentioned, was a most big- 
oted man. He regarded religious liberty as the 
most detestable and baleful of doctrines, and he 
thought “heresy” the most unpardonable of 
crimes. He would say the most bitter things 
against those blackest of malefactors, as he 
thought them, the men who claimed that within 
R 


IN editha’s days 


258 

their own homes men had a right to worship God 
according to their own consciences. 

So it may well be seen that, inasmuch as we 
Anabaptists believe in religious liberty for all 
men, our belief was directly opposed to that of 
Viglius, and none of us could hope for much 
favor at his hands. We should not worship God 
in the manner which we believed the Bible to 
command. 

“ This vague, fireside liberty should be by every 
possible means extirpated,” declared Viglius. 

He was president of the council of Mechlin, 
and it was to that town that Philip II. sent a letter 
giving instructions that the decrees for burning, 
strangling, and burying alive should be carried 
out to the letter. Not only were Anabaptists to . 
be treated so, the king said, but all persons spotted 
with Tuther’s errors. 

All we could do was to be thankful that 
Mechlin was between sixty and seventy miles to 
the south of us, and to hope that the State Coun- 
cil might not move particularly against the Ana- 
baptists of Rotterdam ; for we were there still, 
not finding how we might flee the width of Hol- 
land. We had obtained work and endeavored to 
keep ourselves hidden as much as possible, for we 
knew our danger, and I often thought of that 
company of Anabaptists, of whom I have told 
you, who were killed in Rotterdam fourteen years 
before this, having been betrayed by a woman 
who pretended that she came to borrow a kettle. 


DARK DAYS 


259 


Our little boy, Bliezer, six years old now, was 
very fond of singing, and the hymn he sang most 
was that composed by the converted nun, Eliza- 
beth, who became an Anabaptist and was drowned 
therefor. Her hymn was left to us though, and 
I used to often hear my little boy sing : 


“ In thanks to God will I delight, 

And love and praise with all my might, 

Honor and fear him day and night.’ ’ 

When I heard him sing that, I used so often to 
think of the answers of Elizabeth to the council 
that questioned her. 

“What do you hold concerning infant baptism, 
that you should have had yourself baptized 
again?” 

“No, gentlemen, I have not been baptized again ; 
I was baptized once on my confession of faith ; 
for it is written that baptism belongs to believers.” 

“Are our children then lost because they have 
been baptized? ” questioned the council. 

“No, gentlemen,” replied Elizabeth ; “far be it 
from me that I should condemn children.” 

“Do you not expect salvation from baptism?” 
the questioners continued. 

“No, gentlemen,” returned the young Anabap- 
tist. “ All the waters in the sea cannot save me ; but 
salvation is in Christ ; and he hath commanded me 
to love the Eord my God above all things, and my 
neighbor as myself.” 

She was brought to the torture-tower and tor- 


26 o 


IN EDITH a’ S DAYS 


tured with iron screws, so that she fainted, but 
she would not recant nor tell who it was that bap- 
tized her. And she was drowned. Could I have 
grace enough to follow if the trial came to me ? 

“My grace is sufficient for thee.” 

I remembered the words of the New Testament. 
And still my little boy sang on : 

“ In thanks to God will I delight, 

And love and praise with all my might, 

Honor and fear him day and night.” 


CHAPTER XVII 


STEPHEN AND THYRA DISAPPEAR 

“ T SAW a Benedictine monk to-day,’’ 1501 
A whispered Thyra to me. “Oh, 
Editha, I am sure his face was English ! ” 

There were very troublous times about us, and 
Thyra and Stephen left us and fled. We would 
have followed, but we were arrested and taken to 
prison. Our jailer taunted us with the condition 
of Anabaptists in the Eow Countries, and when- 
ever he heard of a particularly atrocious deed done 
to any of our faith, he spared no pains to tell us of 
it. He it was who told us, with great appearance 
of satisfaction, that Menno Simons, our good Ana- 
baptist preacher, was dead. And it was through 
him that we learned how terrible beyond descrip- 
tion were the deeds done in Flanders to those of 
the reformed religion, and to those who were Ana- 
baptists. We hardly knew whether to believe the 
tales, so dreadful were they, but certain things we 
felt must be true, so real did the jailer make them 
in rehearsing them to us. 

We were greatly alarmed, for Stephen and 
Thyra had betaken themselves to Flanders. We 
heard terrible tales of the things done by the 
Inquisitor, Peter Titelman, he who seemed to 

261 


26 z 


IN editha’s days 


revel in blood, and who galloped through the 
country by night and by day, dragging suspected 
persons from their firesides and beds, putting peo- 
ple into dungeons, arresting, torturing, strangling, 
burning, without scarce waiting for trial or infor- 
mation. 

“He says himself that he rarely waits for 
deeds,” the jailer told us. 

Suspicion was enough. 

A certain schoolmaster, named Geleyn de Muler, 
of Audenarde, used to read the Bible, and Titel- 
man summoned him and accused him of heresy. 
The schoolmaster claimed that if he were guilty 
of any crime, he should be tried before the judges 
of his town. 

“You are my prisoner,” answered Titelman, 
“ and are to answer me and none other.” 

And the schoolmaster was strangled and thrown 
into the fire. 

About the same time a tapestry weaver of Tour- 
nay, Thomas Calberg, was convicted of having 
copied some hymns from a book printed at 
Geneva. For this deed he was burned alive. 

But there came to us a tale of the fate of two 
Anabaptists, and this alarmed us more than ever. 
Certain things made us fear that the two were 
Stephen and Thyra. The story told of the two 
Anabaptists, whoever they were, was a terrible 
one. They being taken prisoners, one of the sol- 
diers had fallen upon the man with a rusty sword, 
dealing him one blow after another, cutting him 


ste:phen and thyra disappear 263 

to death. At this horrible sight, the wife — whom 
we could not doubt to be Thyra — gave a great 
cry, and dropped senseless. When one came to 
lift her, she was found to be dead also. 

Caspar asked me if I thought Thyra would die 
in that way. 

“ She seemed always of a stauncher nature than 
he,” argued my husband, unwilling to believe his 
sister dead. “Would she die even at so dreadful 
a sight? ” 

“ She loved him,” I answered. 

And indeed I cannot well explain how it is, but 
I know that sometimes when a strong, brave 
woman perceives that her husband is not so strong 
and brave as she, there is added to her love for 
him a tender pity, akin to the pity of a mother, 
and she loves him yet the more. And so, though 
I do not rightly or clearly express myself, never 
being a person of much mastery over words, I 
know how Thyra felt. She loved Stephen to the 
end. The sword that killed him pierced her 
heart also, though the weapon did not touch her. 
Caspar was Thyra’s brother, but I felt that I 
understood her better than he. 

“ If that Anabaptist was Stephen, I am sure it 
was some Benedictine monk who killed him,” 
said Caspar. 

I did not answer, for I was thinking of the ter- 
rible tales I had heard of Peter Titelman, that 
very infamous Inquisitor. What was human life 
to the Inquisitors, who would burn men, women, 


IN editua’s days 


264 

and children, and throw away their ashes, for 
words spoken perhaps idly years before against 
Rome, or for praying alone in their closets, or for 
not kneeling to a wafer when meeting it in the 
street, or even for having had thoughts which had 
never been spoken aloud by the persons, but 
which on inquiry they were too honest to deny 
having had. Truly, the cruelty of the Inquisition 
was appalling. 

And now, whether it was that Stephen and 
Thyra were the two Anabaptists who fell thus 
inside Peter Titelman’s bloody domain, or whether 
my cousin and his wife perished in some other 
fashion, I know not. I can write no more of them 
in this chronicle, for they never were seen again 
by us. Yet am I sure that in the list of martyrs 
known in heaven are the names of Stephen and 
Thyra. 

Within a few days we were taken from our 
prison to another and told that we should prepare 
ourselves for death. There was another jailer and 
it was he who made the announcement to us, 
though I think our former guardian would have 
enjoyed telling us that news as well as he had en- 
joyed imparting to us other information. But the 
second jailer told us our sentence with unconcern, 
as being a man who had done such a thing so 
often that he hardly cared to look to see how we 
received the words. Having told us he went 
away. 

After so much of the constant alarm and worry 


STEPHEN AND THYRA DISAPPEAR 265 

of hiding, I think Caspar and I almost expe- 
rienced a feeling of relief to know that the end 
was so near and that we should all die together. 

As I walked the floor of our new cell I discov- 
ered in it a small hole, and no sooner had I 
stepped so as to darken the hole than confused 
cries came from somewhere below. I took my 
foot from the hole and dropped on my knees be- 
side it. 

“ Bread ! bread ! ” 

There were women’s voices that moaned this 
one word, that wailed it, that sobbed it. There 
were men’s voices that repeated the magic word 
over and over as if hardly knowing what they 
said. 

‘‘ Bread ! bread ! bread ! ” 

The voices were in numerous keys, but all to- 
gether they were but as the sound of a chorus that 
dies away for lack of strength. Once the sound 
may have been loud enough, but now it was faint 
with exhaustion. 

Caspar and I had a little bread and some cheese 
about us, having brought the food from the other 
prison. 

We dared not throw all down to the starving 
prisoners but we threw some, and there ensued 
such sobbing cries that we could scarcely endure 
them. We were obliged to hear them the longer 
because of the hole’s smallness, which compelled 
us to break the bread and the cheese before throw- 
ing them down. 


266 


IN editha’s days 


“ Bread ! bread ! ” the voices still sobbed 
hoarsely, and Bliezer burst into tears. 

“Give them mine, mother,” he whispered. 

I looked at Gaspar. 

“ We shall be killed to-morrow,” I said. “ We 
can go without this.” 

So we threw down all that remained save a 
little that Gaspar insisted on keeping for our- 
selves. It was well he did so, as matters went 
afterward ; but I could not have kept a crust, for 
every little while all night long I heard a moan 
from below that sounded like “ Bread ! ” 

Oh, the long, dark hours in which I listened to 
those dreadful moans ! Gaspar had tried to ob- 
tain some information from those wretched pris- 
oners as to who they were, and had succeeded in 
ascertaining that a large number of them were 
brethren of Anabaptist belief. 

The next day we were visited by a man who 
informed us that we were destined to die that 
night. 

“Then we shall spend to-morrow morning in 
heaven,” answered Gaspar intrepidly, *and the 
man went away. 

As he went I recalled to my mind what my 
father had once declared concerning the perse- 
cutions of the Anabaptists : “ Yea, but our perse- 
cutions will work out the religious freedom not 
only of ourselves, but of all other men.” 

If God might grant it ! Surely he heard the 
prayers of the Anabaptists for religious freedom. 


STEPHEN AND THYRA DISAPPEAR 267 

But it had not come yet. I remembered that 
King Philip once wrote a letter in which he said ; 
“Rigorous and severe measures are the only ones 
to be employed in matters of religion. It is by 
fear only that the rabble can be made to do their 
duty, and not always then.” Would religious 
freedom be granted while King Philip lived ? 

Night came. At least we should all die to- 
gether. The moans from the apartment below 
were very faint. There did not seem to be so 
many voices as before. The cry of “Bread” 
had subsided into unintelligible murmurs. We 
threw down a little bread, thinking since we must 
surely now die it would not matter if we went 
hungry to death. But no notice was taken, in 
the room below, • of our gift. The prisoners 
seemed to be too weak to understand, and some 
voices that had been strongest the night before 
were altogether missing now, wherefore we con- 
jectured that some of our fellow-prisoners might 
have been taken away to death without our 
knowledge. 

We sat patiently waiting for the coming of the 
executioners. As our little amount of bread had 
been taken no notice of below, we did not throw 
down any more, and, our own hunger growing 
upon us as the night passed, we divided the last 
of our food and ate it. And still we waited. 
Midnight must be near. 

“Are you afraid, my Eliezer?” I asked my 
boy. 


268 


IN editha’s days 


He answered : “ No, my mother. I am ready.” 

“It is but a little way,” I said. And I did not 
say more, for I knew that my boy was a true 
Christian and was “ ready,” as he declared him- 
self to be, though he was but young. 

We waited. The dark hours were so long. It 
must be midnight. Why did the executioners 
delay ? 

It was dim morning when we heard steps. Our 
door was opened and we were bidden to come out 
for examination before our accusers. 

In an open space near the prison, we found a 
company of our fellow-prisoners assembled. We 
were hastened away with threats of burning. 

And now we came all to the spot where we 
were to be offered up. Two men were bound to 
one stake, and fagots being piled about them, the 
wood was lit, and the smoke rose around the 
heads of the martyrs. To hasten the flames one 
of the executioners went near the pile, and as he 
worked mocked those in the fire. But no answer 
came. 

The flames shot up more brightly and another 
martyr went into the presence of his King. 

And then, one after another of our company of 
prisoners was taken to the stake. We seemed to 
be in regular order. Caspar, and Bliezer, and I, 
were toward the last of the line. Two women 
were led toward the stakes. There were now 
seven other prisoners before me. 

As the two women were set on fire, the flames 


STEPHEN AND THYRA DISAPPEAR 269 

caught the garment of one of the executioners. 
Perhaps some inflammable substance, as pitch, or 
somewhat else, may already have been on his 
garb, for it suddenly flamed up as I never saw 
cloth before, and the men who guarded us sprang 
to put out the fire. 

In that instant of confusion my husband and 
Bliezer grasped my hands, and we sped away. 
Not until we had gained a good distance did we 
hear a cry behind, as of men who had discovered 
our departure. And not ours alone, I think, for I 
had heard other swift footsteps that fled when we 
escaped. 

At first I had no thought but that we would be 
taken. But the darkness of the morning favored 
us, and perhaps the burns of the executioner 
were considerable and delayed the soldiers, for we 
distanced them entirely, and then, hiding under 
an overturned small boat that had been left beside 
a half-dry mere, we remained concealed through- 
out the entire day without anything to eat. Had 
we not had that food to eat during the night be- 
fore, I know well that I, at least, would not have 
had strength to outrun our enemies. 

As we hid beneath the boat we consulted as to 
where we would flee if we might attain the border 
of Holland. We thought of Zealand. We thought 
of German cities. We even thought of Moravia, 
the land where so many Swiss Anabaptists had 
now and formerly taken refuge. England was 
not to be thought of by Anabaptists as a land of 


270 


IN KDITHA’S days 


freedom, for tliough Queen Mary was dead Queen 
Klizabeth was an enemy of Anabaptists. 

When darkness came we crept from beneath our 
providentially provided cover, and, looking fear- 
fully around to see that we were not pursued, jour- 
neyed as far as we could under hiding of the dark. 
A peasant woman of whom we besought food 
gave us some without asking any questions, 
though I think she suspected what we might be. 
But she had a little boy of her own, and she 
looked at Kliezer, and I thought it was for our 
child’s sake that she gave us bread. 

We dared not return to Rotterdam, but fled for- 
ward till we came to Utrecht. Penniless we 
entered into that city, knowing that those who 
arrested us at Rotterdam had no doubt taken our 
scanty goods. The world seemed very lonesome 
without Stephen and Thyra. 

But perhaps this world would not be ours very 
much longer. I thought of what King Philip 
wrote last year to a bishop : “ There are but few 
of us left in the world who care for religion. ’Tis 
necessary, therefore, for us to take the greater 
heed for Christianity.” 

Verily King Philip thought he did God service ! 
So, at least, his words implied. Perhaps his 
soldiers might yet lay hands upon Caspar and 
myself, and prove by our death that King Philip 
“ cared for religion ” ! Philip little thought that 
religious liberty might spring from the graves of 
“ heretics.” 


CHAPTER XVIII 


CONTINUED DANGER 

T N Utrecht and in neighboring villages we con- 
A cealed ourselves from our persecutors, and 
worked as diligently as we could. We found in 
Utrecht an Anabaptist man who had helped his 
poorer brethren before this, and who gave Caspar 
work, and us such protection as was possible. 
This friend had some possessions, and was loath 
to lose them all by flight to another country, 
though he and we often consulted as to which 
land an Anabaptist would be most safe in, were 
he forced to leave the Eow Countries. 

Still we stayed, for it seemed as if such terrible 
times for Anabaptists would not be permitted to 
keep on forever. And still the days of trial con- 
tinued, and we kept ourselves hidden and un- 
known, almost, to our neighbors. It seemed 
wonderful to us that we could so stay in the Eow 
Countries, in the very grasp as it were of our 
enemies, and yet be kept from death. It was 
only through the overshadowing hand of our God 
that we were thus hidden. I realized that, as day 
by day we worked on, and I looked at my hus- 
band and at Kliezer, and thought how marvel- 
ously we three, whose hearts would be so torn by 

271 


272 IN KDITHA’S DAYS 

a separation from one another, were kept, a little 
family, still together. 

But when I remembered all the past — when I 
thought of the fagot pile at Caversham, and of 
the night on which my father was nearly captured, 
and my mother and I went forth, terrified wander- 
ers in the dark ; when I recalled that long wait- 
ing beside the wall, praying that father might 
come ; when I remembered our flight through the 
sheep, and the nearness of our bloodthirsty ene- 
mies and the manner in which we had all escaped 
from England to the Low Countries, I felt that 
the God who had guided us then, watched still 
ovdr Caspar, Eliezer, and me. How could I 
doubt that the deliverance of the Lord had been 
with me, when I remembered the escape of Thyra 
and me from the prison where we had seen the 
strangled Anabaptist and the dying priest, or 
when I remembered my life in the village of 
Scheveningen, and my narrow escape from burial 
at the hands of the soldier, or when I thought of 
the ten years in prison, and our flight and deliver- 
ance from the purpose of Johannes, the traitor? 
When I recalled so many perils and narrow 
escapes as had filled my life, I was wont to ques- 
tion myself: “Cannot God keep us now?” and 
so try to cast my care on him. 

And I would comfort myself by thinking of that 
promise of the New Testament: “If two of you 
shall agree on earth as touching anything that 
they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my 


CONTINUED DANGER 


273 


Father which is in heaven.” Were there not 
many of us Anabaptists who prayed for religious 
liberty ? Had not some of us agreed to pray that 
liberty of soul might come to all men, in the Fow 
Countries and elsewhere ? Was not that the bur- 
den of our prayers, and would not God hear? 
Was prayer nothing ? 

Our boy Eliezer was growing up a fine, earnest 
lad. He was thirteen during those years we 
stayed in Utrecht and the neighboring villages, 
and he often listened to his father’s tale of the 
boy-martyr, the young Anabaptist Jaques Dosie, 
who, though only fifteen years old, had witnessed 
a good confession, and had been put to death over 
in Friesland a few years before this. The wife of 
the governor of Friesland was interested in the 
young boy, and Gaspar would tell Eliezer what 
questions the lady asked of Jaques, and what 
answers the boy gave. I remember once hearing 
Gaspar say : “ The governor’s wife asked Jaques, 

‘ Are you not one of the people who rebaptize 
themselves, and do so much evil in our country, 
exciting uproar, running together, and who say 
that for their faith they are driven away, and 
boast of being the church of God ; but who are a 
dangerous set, and make great disturbance among 
the people ? ’ 

“ But Jaques answered : ‘ My lady, tumultuous 
people I know none, and am in no wise of the 
number of such ; but we desire much rather, as 
the Scripture teaches us, to assist our enemies, and 
s 


274 IN editha’s days 

if they are hungry or thirsty to satisfy them with 
food and drink, and in no wise to resist them by 
violence or to avenge ourselves.’ 

“ The lady asked : ‘ Were they not your people 
who disgracefully and shamefully took up the 
sword against the magistrates at Amsterdam and 
Munster ? ” 

“ ‘ Oh, no, madam,’ returned Jaques ; ‘ those 
persons greatly erred. But we consider it a devil- 
ish doctrine to resist the magistrates by the out- 
ward sword and violence. We would much rather 
suffer persecution and death at their hands, and 
whatever is appointed us to suffer. ’ 

“ And afterward the lady asked the boy : * Do 
you not think that all are lost who are not bap- 
tized in your way ? ’ 

“ ‘ Oh, no, madam,’ answered Jaques again. 
‘Judgment belongs to God alone, who will reward 
every man according to his works, as plainly 
appears in many places of the Holy Scriptures. 
Besides, water has no power to cleanse us from sin, 
as Peter says ; but is only a token of obedience.’ 

“And in answer to some question, Jaques said 
too : ‘ Concerning the use of infant baptism, we 
speak with reason against it, as being no com- 
mand of Almighty God ; but much rather an 
invention of men, considering that the young 
children have no knowledge or discernment 
about whatever is required and contained in the 
baptismal service. But Christ, from affection to 
such innocents, without their seeking it them- 


CONTINUED DANGER 


275 

selves, gi'aciously promised them the kingdom of 
God.’ 

“The lady told him that she considered the 
worst in the Anabaptists to be their refusal to 
baptize children. ‘For all Germany, and every 
kingdom,’ said she, ‘regard your conduct as 
heresy.’ And Jaques answered: ‘Madam, such 
is indeed the truth, that we are everywhere con- 
temned, and are, like the apostolic band, spoken 
against in all the world ; but do not think that all 
such will therefore in the last day be lost. ’ 

“And so, although the lady besought him to 
repent of his baptism, saying that it would be a 
heavy cross to her heart if so young a child as he 
should die, yet the boy Jaques was steadfast, de- 
claring: ‘Madam, in my baptism I can find 
nothing criminal, considering that herein I have 
followed not my own will, but the institution of 
our Lord Jesus Christ.’ ” 

So did the boy die, being put to death by those 
who would not suffer him to have religious liberty. 

Bliezer used to listen to the tale, and I thought 
he pondered it so gravely afterward that I was 
moved with fear lest a premonition that martyr- 
dom was to be his own end had come to him. I 
shrank from such a belief, and I wished he and his 
father would not talk so much of Jaques Dosie. 

But a new year dawned, and matters changed. 
In this year there came unexpected news. 1550 
Liberty of worship was granted the “new re- 
ligion. ” The Inquisition was said to be done away. 


IN ebitha’s days 


276 

Had liberty indeed come? We Anabaptists 
looked at one another in amazement. If the Re- 
formed had religious freedom, possibly Anabap- 
tists might be treated less cruelly. 

“God has touched King Philip’s heart,” rever- 
ently murmured one woman. 

Gaspar’s face glowed. 

“If liberty of conscience is granted,” he ex- 
claimed, “what a land will the Netherlands be- 
come ! This dear land ! ” 

And because he believed that liberty of worship 
would probably continue, and because I also had 
much faith that bright days had dawned, and that 
Philip, perceiving that the Catholic could never 
be the only religion of the Netherlands, had re- 
lented, we remained in the Low Countries. 

Very peaceful and sweet was our dream of lib- 
erty, after so many years of danger. 

“ It is good that we brought our boy back to 
his father’s country,” Gaspar said, looking fondly 
at Bliezer. 

And indeed England had been so hard a country 
to me, that I answered, “Yes, I am glad we have 
come back to the Low Countries.” 

But our dream of freedom soon ended. The 
next year we bewailed ourselves that we had not 
fled. At this time the Catholics were triumphant. 
Troops belonging to the regent rode over the 
country, and wherever the Reformed were 1507 
gathered to hear the word, they were dis- 
turbed by the troopers, who trampled the people 


CONTINUED DANGER 


277 


under the horses’ hoofs, shooting persons down, or 
dragging them away by scores to execution. Peo- 
ple either bribed the priests to keep silence, or 
else came compulsorily to mass. There were 
many who violated their consciences to save their 
lives. Along the roads, everywhere, bodies were 
hanging from gibbets, churches were pulled down, 
and people were hung from the beams. 

The regent issued in May an edict sentencing 
all ministers and teachers to the gallows. All 
persons who had allowed their houses to be used 
for religious purposes were sentenced to the gal- 
lows. All people who sang hymns at the burial of 
any relative were sentenced to the gallows. It 
was made a capital crime to sneer against priests. 

Such laws drove timid people, who dared not 
stand for their religion, into hypocrisy. Persons 
who for years had not gone to mass, now attended 
the Catholic services, morning and night. Persons 
who had scornfully spoken to Catholic ecclesias- 
tics, now would not eat dinner without some priest 
at the table. 

I shall never forget something I saw this year. 
Gaspar and Bliezer and I had fled from Utrecht 
for a time. In our wanderings we came to a place 
where a mere had been. Hearing voices, we con- 
cealed ourselves. 

The mere had been drained, so that the soil 
was but a little damp. In what had once been 
the bed of the mere something terrible was trans- 
piring. A company, apparently prisoners and 


IN editha’s days 


278 

their guards, stood there. Where we lay we could 
plainly hear the accusations cast upon the prison- 
ers of being heretics and Miinsterites. Some of 
our Anabaptist brethren without doubt stood 
there. 

“The men are digging,’’ whispered Caspar to 
me. 

It was too true. In five or six places the men 
were upturning the earth. Alas ! We knew for 
what awful purpose this must be. Continually, 
as the guards waited to be relieved of their pris- 
oners, there were to be heard mockings and cruel 
jests. I longed for the power of an army to come 
down into this mere and snatch the poor Ana- 
baptist victims from the grasp of their heartless 
enemies. 

There was a movement in the group below. It 
parted and two girls stood forth in front of the 
other persons. Those who had been digging one 
of the graves were waiting for something. 

“ Come ! ” sternly ordered a soldier. 

I remembered how nearly I had been put to 
death once in this manner. The two young 
maidens took each other’s hand and walked intrep- 
idly forward. One of them began to sing tri- 
umphantly. I heard the words. They were those 
of Coverdale’s hymn : 

Be glad now, all ye Christian men, 

And let us rejoyce unfaynedly. 

The kindnesse cannot be written with penne, 

That we have receaved of God’s mercy; 


CONTINU£:d danger 


279 


Whose love toward us hath never end ; 

He hath done for us as a frende ; 

Now let us thanke him hartely. 

These lovynge wordes he spake to me : 

I wyll delyver thy soule from payne ; 

I am disposed to do for thee, 

And to myne owne selfe thee to retayne. 

Thou shalt be with me for thou art myne ; 

And I with thee, for I am thyne ; 

Such is my love, I cannot layne. 

The clear, exultant voice never failed. Now, 
as the two girls were roughly pushed into a single, 
wide pit, and the soldiers stood ready to throw the 
earth upon the bright young martyr heads, both 
maiden voices arose in unison in the words that 
Coverdale represents our Lord as saying : 

They will shed out my precyous bloude, 

And take away my lyfe also. 

Which I wyll suffre all for their good ; 

Beleve this sure, where ever thou go, 

For I will yet ryse up agayne. 

Thy synnes I beare, thought it be pa)me, 

To make thee safe and free from wo. 

The earth went hastily in. The executioners 
seemed eager to be through. But the girls be- 
gan another hymn, heard spasmodically through 
the falling earth. It was the hymn of a martyr, 
and was sung in Dutch : 

Of such a man fear not the will, 

A body — only he can — ^kill, 

A faithful God — thee rather fear. 

Who— can — condemn to darkness drear. 


28 o 


IN editha’s days 


O Christ — ^help through — ^thy little flock, 

Who — faithful — follow thee — ^their Rock, 

By thine — own death 

A soldier bent over the edge of the pit, and 
with his shovel dealt two savage blows on the 
fair heads below. When he drew his shovel up 
I fancied it was red. 

More hurriedly than ever the earth went in. 
There was no sound but that of the falling gravel. 
The grave was filled and stamped till the ground 
was hard. The young Anabaptists were safe at 
last. 

“ They were English,” I whispered to Caspar. 

A cry of agony rose from the mere. We looked 
and saw a man struggling with the guards who 
kept him back. He held out his arms toward a 
woman who was being led in the direction of an- 
other open grave. 

“Oh, my wife ! my heart ! my life’s love ! ” 
cried the man in Dutch. 

The soldiers mocked him, but after the scorn- 
ful laughter ceased, the woman’s voice arose in 
the same language, clear, distinct, though she 
was being bound and might not turn her head to 
look at him : “ My beloved, I shall see thee again 
in our Father’s kingdom.” 

The woman was fastened into a coffin-like re- 
ceptacle and thrown into the grave. Other 
women followed her. There were men who were 
evidently prisoners, but none of them were 
buried. They were probably brought there to 


CONTINUED DANGER 


281 


cause them the agony of seeing their dearest 
buried alive. The stake or the multiplied tortures 
of the Inquisition awaited them. 

The living burials went on. I wished that my 
boy need not have seen the sight. But after the 
first two graves were filled he threw his arms 
about me and hid his face on my shoulder so that 
he saw no more. 

“ If they should bury you^ mother ! If they 
should bury you ’ he whispered. And I could 
feel him sob silently with the grief of one to 
whom a thought too terrible to be borne has come. 

After I had quieted him I turned to Gaspar. 

“ My husband,” I whispered. 

He looked at me. The dear, patient kindness 
of those eyes ! How much he and I had borne 
and suffered together ! My heart was very full as 
I whispered my question. 

“ It is the same it used to be, Gaspar ! Oh, my 
husband, where is the religious liberty that Ana- 
baptists have striven and prayed for so * long ? It 
is not in England, it is not in the Low Coun- 
tries ! ” 

“My Editha,” whispered Gaspar — and his 
whisper was tremulous with feeling — “religious 
liberty will rise from such graves as those of the 
buried Anabaptist women in that mere.” 

He pointed downward to where the awful sac- 
rifice of human life went on. 

“ Can such fruits come from death ? ” my 
thoughts questioned one another. “ How long, 


^82 


IN editha’s days 


O Lord, how long shall such things be? How 
long, O Lord, God of freedom, shall men cry out 
for religious liberty and see it not ? ” 

A chant, as of those who sang with exceeding 
gladness, burst forth from below. The last four 
Anabaptist women advanced to the only grave 
that was now open. 

“ Be strong ! Be strong ! It is but the gateway 
of heaven ! ’’ cried an old man, a prisoner, as the 
women paused beside the grave. 

“I shall rise again,” triumphantly answered 
one of the women. 

Then I thought there was a thrill of supersti- 
tious fear in the voice of the soldier, who shouted : 
“ Anabaptist ! Vile heretic ! Be quiet ! ” 

Perhaps he feared to meet sometime one who 
spoke so confidently of her resurrection. 

But the chant rose again with its exceeding 
gladness, and the men prisoners added their 
voices. 

“We ascend unto God,” they all sang, “unto 
God, our Redeemer. Father, forgive our enemies. ’ * 

The women were hastily thrown into the grave 
and buried. But the triumph of those chanting 
voices rang yet in my ears. The hoiTor of the 
scene was almost obliterated so great had been 
the gladness with which those Anabaptists wel- 
comed heaven. 

Thrilled by what we were seeing and hearing 
we had hardly given more than a thought to our 
own safety. But now the soldiers drove their 


CONTINUED DANGER 283 

prisoners forward, though not quite in our direc- 
tion. We lay crouching close to the ground, our 
hearts beating violently, fearing lest the soldiers 
should suddenly veer toward our hiding place. 
But they and their prisoners passed on. 

“ Oh, my Bditha ! my Editha ! ’’ groaned Gas- 
par ; “ why did I ever bring you to this country?” 

I tried to comfort him by telling him that per- 
haps we might yet escape from it. 

But he knew, as well as I, the royal ordinance 
that had been given forth that year : “It is for- 
bidden to any one to leave the land, or to send off 
his effects, without obtaining a license from the 
authorities, under pain of being regarded as hav- 
ing taken part in the late troubles, and of being 
dealt with accordingly. All masters and owners 
of vessels who shall aid such persons in their 
flight, shall incur the same penalties.” 

The penalties were death and confiscation of 
property. Soon after the promulgation of this 
ordinance, ten of the principal merchants of Tour- 
nay were arrested and their estates were confis- 
cated, because there was suspicion, probably 
well-grounded, that they were preparing to flee. 

Moreover, it was decreed by our enemies, that 
whosoever fled from the Low Countries now 
miofht never return ! To a man who loved his 
native land this was a hard thing. 

“ But some have fled in safety,” I tried to cheer 
Caspar. “Some have reached safety in Ger- 
many, and why not we ? ” 


284 


IN editha’s days 


“My Editha,’’ he answered heavily, his face yet 
against the ground, “ if it is God’s will ! ” 

I was growing almost frightened about my hus- 
band in these days. His one thought seemed to 
be to protect his wife and his boy. A great mel- 
ancholy seemed to have laid hold of Gaspar, and 
I feared lest his health should break with the 
strain. 

Oh, if we could have fled ! But flight was be- 
coming almost impossible. The shipmasters and 
wagoners were afraid to assist any heretic to 
escape, though numbers of people had succeeded 
in leaving the Netherlands, even after the edict of 
May. Whether a person were a foreigner or a 
native of the Netherlands, however, he was for- 
bidden to leave the country. 

“If we could reach the Zuyder Zee ! If we 
might flee across it to Embden ! ” 

Such were our thoughts. We tried to bargain 
with a wagoner to conceal us in his wagon and 
carry us away as far as he would. But, although 
he agreed to do so, yet we discovered in time that 
he was a traitor, and only waited to deliver us into 
the hands of the priests. 

With difficulty my husband and I made our 
way again northeastward to Utrecht. There we 
hid ourselves from the enemy as well as we could, 
and stayed for a time, seeing no way by which we 
might continue our journey eastward toward Ger- 
many. 

The regent, the Duchess of Parma, resigned, 


CONTINUED DANGER 285 

and at last left tlie Netherlands, toward the end 
of this year. So did Margaret close her bloody 
career among us. 

Philip had written to his sister, the regent, say- 
ing : “I have never had any object in view than 
the good of my subjects. In all that I have done 
I have but trod in the footsteps of my father, 
under whom the people of the Netherlands must 
admit they lived contented and happy. As to the 
Inquisition, whatever people may say of it, I have 
never attempted anything new. With regard to 
edicts, I have been always resolved to live and 
die in the Catholic faith. I could not be content 
to have my subjects do otherwise. Yet I see not 
how this can be compassed without punishing the 
transgressors. God knows how willingly I would 
avoid shedding a drop of Christian blood— above 
all, that of my people in the Netherlands ; and I 
should esteem it one of the happiest circum- 
stances of my reign to be spared this necessity.” 

And yet that bloody man, Alva, was after- 1507 
ward sent to the lyow Countries with an 
army of about ten thousand veterans, and he 
established that fearful tribunal of twelve judges, 
called originally the “ Council of his Excellency,” 
but named by the people the “ Council of Blood.” 
Surely Philip might have spared his “people in 
the Netherlands” this. 

While we were yet hiding at Utrecht a 1503 
new year came. A most dreadful order was 
issued in February, condemning the entire popu- 


286 


IN kditha’s days 


lation of the Netherlands, with but few excep- 
tions, to death as heretics. The helpless people 
were doomed. The king ordered this death war- 
rant to be executed at once, ‘ ‘ without any hope 
of grace whatever, that it might serve for an 
example and a warning to all future time.’’ 

A new horror was added to the executions. To 
prevent the persons who were to be killed from 
addressing the people on the way, each prisoner’s 
tongue was forced through an iron ring, and then 
burnt with a hot iron. This treatment caused 
the tongue to swell so that it became impossible 
to speak, especially as it was compressed between 
two plates of metal screwed fast together. The 
groans of the tortured men sounded strangely, 
and at one time in a company who looked at such 
a horror and heard the sounds, a friar cried out : 
“Hark, how they sing! Should they not be 
made to dance too ? ” 

During the four months ending the first of June, 
the persecution was most severe. Alva spoke of 
eight hundred victims, Viglius said that fifteen 
hundred were cited before the tribunal. To 
Philip, Alva had said that he wished that every 
man as he lay down at night, or as he rose in the 
morning, “might feel that his house at any hour 
might fall and crush him.” 

I think Alva obtained the meaning of his wish. 

No wonder that many people wished to flee 
from the Netherlands. Queen Elizabeth of Eng- 
land had welcomed many Netherlanders who had 


CONTINUED DANGER 28/ 

fled to her realm, and had assig-ned them towns, 
as Sandwich, Norwich, and other places, where 
about thirty thousand emigrants from the lyow 
Countries had been established. But alas ! 
though Queen Klizabeth valued the mechanical 
skill of the people of the lyow Countries, and the 
English were glad to be taught to make silk, and 
satin, and cloth, yet the queen was not a friend to 
Anabaptists, and early in this year the English 
bishops had obtained a proclamation from the 
queen directing a severe visitation to be made 
through Eondon, and ordering all persons “ that 
have conceived any manner of such heretical 
opinions as the Anabaptists do hold, and mean- 
eth not by charitable teaching to be reconciled, 
to depart out of this realm within twenty days, 
upon pain of forfeiture of all their goods, and to 
be imprisoned and further punished.’’ 

Religious freedom had not yet come to Eng- 
land. And in our poor Eow Countries it was 
common to see thirty or forty persons arrested at 
once. 

In the dreadful state of affairs, following the 
order condemning all the Netherlanders to death, 
we looked to William the Silent for help. He 
strove to raise an army, but the expense was very 
great. The prince pawned his jewels and sent 
his . plate to the mint. Nor was this all. Prince 
William announced his intention of expelling the 
Spaniards forever from the country. Money was 
very necessary to accomplish this great deed. 


288 


IN editha’s days 


Prince William appealed to all his countrymen, 
even to those in poverty, to contribute toward this 
undertaking. 

And, in this paper, Prince William quoted those 
three verses of Proverbs : 

“ The hope of the righteous shall be gladness : 
but the expectation of the wicked shall perish. 

“ The way of the Tord is strength to the up- 
right : but destruction shall be to the workers of 
iniquity. 

“ The righteous shall never be removed : but 
the wicked shall not inhabit the earth.” 

It was a terrible war in which the Prince of 
Orange was about to engage. He had now 
brought together an army of nearly thirty thou- 
sand men. He wanted money for the war. And, 
alas ! how little money came in. Of three hun- 
dred thousand crowns promised by Marcus Perez, 
on behalf of the leading merchants and nobles of 
the Netherlands, but ten or twelve thousand came. 
1568 Then was the hour for Anabaptist aid ! 
A.D. Then a poor refugee congregation of Ana- 
baptists remembered to help our prince, and an 
Anabaptist preacher risked his life to bring the 
small, hardly-spared sum of money to William’s 
camp. Oh, the prince never forgot that ! 

Dissenting preachers, staiwing and persecuted 
church communities sent in contributions in 
course of time. 

I think that William the Silent knew the Ana- 
baptists better after that. He knew that Anabap- 


CONTINUED DANGER 


289 

list hearts could be loyal to the cause of their 
country’s freedom. Perhaps he may not in his 
earlier years have known how wholly Anabaptists 
believe in religious liberty for all men. 

And I am proud to think that in the sorest strait 
in which a country might be, we of the Anabap- 
tist faith proved ourselves right loyal men and 
women, who, even if we did not believe in war, 
yet held ourselves ready to pay for our substi- 
tutes, and to give freely all we could toward the 
release of our land from the grasp of Spain. 
Perhaps we might have seemed more brave had 
we thought the word of God allowed us to bear 
arms. And, verily, if there was ever a righteous 
war, it was this war with Spain. But let me say 
that it required more control of self, more denial 
of one’s own feelings, not to rush to arms in 
these years of bitter persecution than it would 
have required to go. For Anabaptists had brave 
hearts, and it is not always easy to resist one’s in- 
clination to right one’s own wrongs instead of 
waiting for the arm of the Lord. 

It is a brave heart that dares obey God and take 
the risk of being called a coward by one’s fellow- 
men. God save the Anabaptists from taking ven- 
geance into their own hands. 

Indeed, if we had believed in fighting, we 
might have been heroes in the eyes of worldly 
people, but I doubt whether we should have done 
deeds more thrilling, more heroic, than those that 
Anabaptists did do. 

T 


290 


IN editha’s days 


1509 It was in tlie next year that Dirk Willem- 
zoon, an Anabaptist who was guilty of no 
crime, but who had been baptized and had had 
meetings at his house, was escaping, after having 
been condemned to death. An officer of justice 
was pursuing Willemzoon, who fled across a frozen 
lake. The ice trembled and cracked beneath the 
Anabaptist’s footsteps, but he reached the farther 
shore safely. 

The officer who pursued was so unfortunate as 
to feel the ice give way beneath him. He fell 
through into the water, giving a cry for help. 

Willemzoon could not leave his enemy to 
drown, and coming back across the dangerous ice, 
helped him to safety. But Willemzoon paid his 
life for the merciful deed. 

Though the officer did wish to avoid the respon- 
sibility of murdering his preserver, yet the burgo- 
master of Asperen sternly reminded him to re- 
member his oath. Thereupon the officer arrested 
Willemzoon, who was burned to death under the 
most lingering tortures. 

But what could one expect when the Duke of 
Alva gave such dreadful instructions to the mag- 
istrates? Daily people were burned or hanged. 
The duke was very strict about the baptism of 
infants, it being ordered that the birth of every 
child should be reported within twenty-four hours 
in order that the Catholic baptism might be ad- 
ministered. Of course such an order would be 
particularly abhorrent to Anabaptist parents. 


CONTINUED DANGER 


291 


Moreover, the magistrates were ordered by the 
duke to appoint certain spies, who should keep 
watch at every administration of the sacraments 
and report any persons who did not pay suitable 
honor to the sacraments, such persons to be 
burned to death. But a most shocking order was 
that the same spies were to keep watch beside dy- 
ing persons and give immediate notice to the gov- 
ernment of all people who dared die without 
receiving extreme unction and the holy wafer. 
The estates of all such dead persons were to be 
confiscated, and their bodies dragged to the public 
place of execution. 

In such times of peril many were the kindly 
deeds that even a persecuted Anabaptist might do, 
and often, when Gaspar and I were helping some 
poor dying Protestant, I have felt that perhaps 
this was one of the reasons why the Tord had 
allowed us to come to the I^ow Countries, that we 
might minister to his children, even though they 
might not be of the same faith as we were, and 
even though if we had been in their plight, they 
might have hesitated about relieving Anabaptists. 

From one place to another we had gone, being 
unable to continue our eastward journey. We had 
hidden long at Utrecht, so long that we com- 
menced to do business in a humble way, and had 
felt a certain sense of content, even in the midst 
of such dreadful times. One can grow used to 
almost anything. 

At last we fled from Utrecht and wandered home- 


2^2 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


less again till finally we found our way to I^eyden, 
and there, hidden as one sometimes can hide in 
a city, we tried to make our home. And so we 
were in Leyden the year when the Spanish army 
began its siege of that place. From the last of 
1573-4 October till into the next March Leyden 
was besieged, and then, in order to meet the 
army of Louis of Nassau, brother of William the 
Silent, the Spanish army went away. 

Great was our joy. We were quite certain we 
had nothing more to fear. Louis of Nassau would 
be victorious. The Spanish army would be 
routed. Or if it were not, almost five months of 
siege had taught the enemy the difficulty of tak- 
ing our city. Surely we might trust our troubles 
were over, in great measure, from Spanish hands. 

“Perhaps,” I said to Caspar, “when the Span- 
iards are defeated and driven from the land, the 
people of the Low Countries may have had so 
much trouble that we shall all live together in 
peace, and even Anabaptists may have religious 
liberty ; for every person in this country might 
have freedom of conscience. Would not that be 
a glorious outcome of these dreadful years ? ” 

“May God grant it,” answered Caspar devoutly. 
But his tone was not expectant. 


CHAPTER XIX 


THE SIEGE OF EEYDEN 

“ IT 7 HAT are the people calling?” I 1574 
VV asked. 

We listened. 

Excited voices came to our ears. 

“ Count Louis is defeated ! ” 

“ Count Louis is dead ! ” 

“ Louis of Nassau has failed !” 

“ Count Henry is dead, and Duke Christopher ! ” 
“ Four thousand men were killed ! ” 

“ Some were slain on the field, some were sufib- 
cated in the marshes, some were burned in the 
farmhouses ! ” 

Such were the wild rumors that flew through 
Leyden. 

‘‘The Spaniards will come back and attack us 
again,” prophesied one man. 

“Perhaps not,” returned another. “There is 
mutiny among them. Three years’ pay is due the 
soldiers.” 

“ Leyden has her walls and her stout hearts,” 
cried another citizen. “ Know you surely that 
Count Louis is defeated ? ’ ’ 

“ It is the rumor,” answered still another. 
“Then sorrow fills the heart of the Prince of 


293 


294 


IN editha’s days 


Orange,” returned the first man, “ to lose a 
brother like lyouis of Nassau.” 

We knew it was probable, unless the Spanish 
mutiny were too great, that the siege of I^eyden 
would be begun again. The twenty-sixth of May 
the leader of our enemies, Valdez, reappeared be- 
fore our city. The siege began. Valdez took the 
Hague, Maeslandshuis and Vlaardingen. Five 
hundred English abandoned the fortress of Valk- 
enburg, and fled toward Eeyden. But the men 
of our city, having good reason to distrust the 
English, refused to admit the five hundred inside 
Eeyden. They surrendered to Valdez, and they 
afterward were sent to England. 

“We should have taken the advice of the 
Prince to victual our city and strengthen the gar- 
rison, while we had time,” groaned one man of 
Eeyden as we faced the siege that was before us. 

“ Who would have thought that we would have 
to endure a second siege ? ” questioned another. 
“Who would have thought that Eouis of Nassau 
would fail ? ’ ’ 

We had surely cause for alarm. There were by 
this time no less than sixty-two redoubts girdling 
the city and we heard that the army besieging us 
already numbered nearly eight thousand men. 
These were daily added to by our enemies. And 
within Eeyden, alas, what had we? Five com- 
panies of the burgher guard and a small corps of 
freebooters. What were they against our enemies ? 
We had no troops save those I have mentioned. 


THE SIEGE OE LEYDEN 


295 


And on I^eyden depended the fate of all Hol- 
land, the fate not only of ourselves, but of gen- 
erations to come. If we should fail, farewell to 
civil or religious liberty in these Netherlands. 
The critical hour had come. Now, if the prayers 
of Anabaptists ever ascended to the God of free- 
dom, now was the time for them. 

William the’ Silent sent a message to Leyden 
imploring the inhabitants to hold out at least 
three months, and assuring us that in that time 
he would find means to help us. He reminded 
us that we were not to contend for ourselves alone, 
but that the fate of our country and of unborn 
generations would, in all human probability, de- 
pend on the issue of this siege. Eternal glory 
would be our portion if we manifested a courage 
worthy of our race and of the sacred cause of re- 
ligion and liberty. 

‘ ‘ If this freedom from Spain and the Catholics 
is secured will the Lutherans let us Anabaptists 
have freedom ? ” asked an Anabaptist woman of 
me, doubtfully. 

She had learned the bitter lesson that even 
Protestants can persecute Anabaptists. She 
dreaded lest there should come another tyranny 
upon our sect, though Spain and the Papists were 
repulsed. 

“ William the Silent will not forget what Ana- 
baptists have done for him,” I answered. “As 
certainly as William conquers in this war he will 
not allow others to persecute us, no matter what 


296 IN EDITHA’S DAYS 

Protestants may wish to do to us. I am certain 
of that.’’ 

And as after events showed my confidence in 
William the Silent was not misplaced. He never 
forgot that the Anabaptists had in his time of 
need given him out of their most bitter poverty 
the money they could. William believed in lib- 
erty for us as well as for the Reformed. 

But now, while L^eyden was in such straits, 
King Philip thought it time to try a treacherous 
plan of his. He issued a pardon, inviting all his 
repentant subjects to return to him and receive full 
forgiveness. The only condition that he imposed 
upon us was that we should all return likewise to 
the Mother Church. We were, with the exception 
of but a small number of persons who were men- 
tioned, to be forgiven. We, who had been con- 
demned to death. 

But the people of Holland would not surrender 
to King Philip in this manner. They knew well 
how much faith that cruel man would keep with 
those whom he called “heretics.” And though 
we Anabaptists did not believe in war, yet I think 
all our hearts beat faster when we heard of the 
brave saying of the Prince of Orange, after the 
second siege of lyeyden had begun : “As long as 
there is a living man left in the country, we will 
contend for our liberty and our religion.” 

And would you know how many persons availed 
themselves of King Philip’s offer of pardon? 
Two, only. One brewer of Utrecht and the son 


THE SIEGE OE EEYDEN 297 

of a refugee peddler from I^eyden. All Holland 
treated the king’s offer with contempt. 

Treacherous letters were sent into I^eyden by 
certain Netherlanders who belonged to the king’s 
party, and in these letters the citizens of our city 
were urgently, and sometimes pathetically, im- 
plored to submit to the king, and “ to take pity 
upon their poor old fathers, their daughters, and 
their wives.” 

“Take pity upon them!” repeated Bliezer 
scornfully. “ The best pity we can show to our 
fathers, our daughters, and our wives, is to keep 
them out of the hands of the Spanish soldiers.” 

And so thought the burghers of Beyden. 

But our situation was now growing grave. By 
the end of June the people of our city were 
placed on a strict allowance of food. Before this 
our citizens had taken account of their provisions 
of all kinds, and of their livestock. The city 
authorities purchased all the provisions, and now 
half a pound of meat and half a pound of bread 
was allotted to each man, and some due proportion 
to the rest of us. We were so besieged that there 
could be no communication between us and the 
outside world, except by carrier pigeons, and by a 
few swift messengers called “jumpers.” 

One day I heard in the street the sound of a 
man’s voice that sang loudly, in Dutch of course, 
some verses deriding the Inquisition. 

There was silence for a few moments after he 
paused. Then an excited confusion of voices was 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


298 

audible, and then the man’s song began again. 
Other rough voices sang with him. I could 
plainly hear the words of another song, with 
which I had grown familiar during the siege. A 
favorite verse began with the words, 

’ T swaert is getrokken^ 


which mean in English : 

The sword is now drawn. 

I looked out, and a dreadful sight met my eyes. 
A man of Leyden stood singing, holding aloft the 
bloody, ghastly head of a Spaniard. I drew back, 
unable to bear the sight of that grisly, blood- 
stained head held aloft. 

But the dreadful exultant voices went on out- 
side. 

Oh, the sword was taken ! It was taken. But 
was this the way that God meant religious liberty 
to come ? How could that man send an enemy 
down to death unprepared ? That Spanish sol- 
dier — where was his soul now? Would it not be 
better that every Anabaptist, every Reformed per- 
son in the Netherlands, should be offered up in 
martyrdom, being ready to die, than send one of 
our enemies to eternity unprepared ? 

“ ’7" swaert is getrokken I ” shouted the triumph- 
ant voices. 

The men went with the victor to obtain the 
reward offered any man who brought in a Span- 


THE SIEGE OK EEYDEN 


299 


iard’s head. And I knelt there, horror-stricken, 
listening to the voices as they died in the distance. 

“All they that take the sword shall perish with 
the sword.’’ 

Our lyord said it. Perhaps this Spanish soldier 
but received his due reward. Yet I hoped and 
prayed that no hands dear to me might ever be 
stained with the blood of an enemy. Anabaptists 
do not believe in war. It was a relief to me, and 
I doubt not to others, when the church bell was 
rung in I^eyden, and it was forbidden that in 
future any man should leave the city gates. The 
authorities were becoming afraid lest the city, 
little by little, should lose its few disciplined de- 
fenders, in such sorties and combats as had been 
going on. 

And so the days of our siege continued. Val- 
dez, at the end of July, sent the citizens of Teyden 
most urgent and ample offers of pardon if we 
would open our gates and accept Philip’s author- 
ity. But though we were almost at the point of 
starvation, we would not accept. 

“ Remember Haarlem ! ” whispered one to 
another, warningly. “ Remember Naarden ! ” 

We did remember. We remembered that starv- 
ing, dying, gallantly resisting Haarlem had at 
last surrendered, because of a promise written in 
the name of Count Overstein, commander of the 
German forces in the besieging army, and sent by 
Don Frederic. The letter contained a solemn 
assurance that no punishment should be inflicted 


300 


IN bditha’s days 


except upon those who, in the judgment of the 
citizens of Haarlem, had deserved it. Ample for- 
giveness was promised, if Haarlem would submit 
without delay. And yet at the very moment of 
sending that letter, Don Frederic knew that he 
had strict orders from his father not to leave a 
man alive in the garrison, except the Germans. 

Haarlem surrendered. Five executioners, with 
their attendants, were kept constantly at work, 
and when they were exhausted, three hundred of 
the victims were tied two and two, back to back, 
and drowned in Haarlem lake. Twenty-three 
hundred murders were accomplished in that city 
before the treacherous ‘ ‘ pardon ’ ^ was allowed to 
be extended. That was the Spanish way of keep- 
ing a promise. 

We did remember Haarlem. And we remem- 
bered Naarden. We remembered that Julian 
Romero agreed with the deputation from Naar- 
den, and speaking in the authority commissioned 
him by Don Frederic, said that the lives and 
property of all the inhabitants of Naarden 
should be sacredly respected. To show that the 
promise was honest, Don Julian gave his hand 
three times to one of the men of the deputation 
from Naarden. 

And that deputation, trusting in the Spanish 
promise, surrendered the keys of the city. All 
the housewives of Naarden went to preparing a 
great feast for the Spaniards. The Spaniards ate 
readily, and after the dinner the citizens were 


THE SIEGE OF EEYDEN 


301 


summoned to assemble in tbe Gast Huis Church, 
which was then used as a town hall. Five hun- 
dred people came there to hear what should be 
said to them. 

A priest had been walking to and fro before the 
church door. Suddenly he walked into the build- 
ing and bade the people prepare for death. A 
band of Spaniards sprang in, fired on the people, 
and then leaped upon them with daggers and 
swords. There was a great scream. It took but 
a few minutes. The very senator at whose table 
the Spanish commander had just been entertained 
was stricken down. All were killed and the 
church was set on fire. 

The Spaniards rushed into the streets. The 
town was fired in every direction. The citizens 
rushed into the streets. Some people were chopped 
to pieces with axes. Horrors were enacted. Some 
hundred burghers escaped across the snow into 
the open country. They were overtaken, their 
clothing torn from them, and they were hung 
upon the trees by the feet to freeze or die a lin- 
gering death. Most of the burghers died. Nearly 
all the inhabitants of N aarden were killed. A little 
while afterward the city was razed to the ground. 
That was the Spanish way of keeping a promise. 

We of Teyden would not be so deceived. The 
dead of Haarlem and Naarden were pur warning, 
and though we did not know exactly what the 
Prince of Orange was doing, yet we chose to be- 
lieve in William rather than in the Spanish. 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


303 

“ Better a drowned land than a lost land,’’ the 
Estates had cried, at last giving their consent to 
William’s plan of letting in the sea, and so coin- 
ing to Eey den’s relief. 

We knew the Spaniards would be in consterna- 
tion if the sea came. But in Eeyden, alas ! alas ! 
How should we endure much longer? Our bread 
was gone. We ate malt cake, and we had little 
of that. The twelfth of August we had word 
from the prince, saying we should have speedy 
relief. It had need be speedy. The twenty-first 
we sent word to him that we had kept our pro- 
mise, for we had held out two months with food, 
and another month without food. 

Our malt cake would last but four days more, 
and then if no help came we must starve. We 
did not know that William was ill with a violent 
fever. 

But on the very day on which this dispatch was 
sent from Eeyden to Prince William, a letter was 
received by us saying that the dykes were all 
pierced, and that the water was rising upon the 
Eand-scheiding, the strong dyke, within five miles 
of Leyden, serving to keep us from the sea. 

Ah, glad news ! The letter was read in the 
market-place of Leyden, and the city musicians 
were sent about the streets playing, and cannon 
were fired. 

But the gladness passed as the days went by. 
Where was the flood of waters which we had be- 
lieved would come to dismay the Spaniards, and 


THE SIEGE OE LEYDEN 303 

to bring us the ships of our friends ? Were we 
then deceived ? 

A few of the citizens of Leyden were royalists, 
and they taunted us with our hope of relief. 

“Go up to the tower, ye beggars,” cried the 
royalists ; “go up to the tower, and tell us if ye 
can see the ocean coming over the dry land to 
your relief.” 

And day after day we climbed the ruined, an- 
cient tower of Hengist, to see if the waters of 
the ocean were in sight. 

Below we could see the lime trees, poplars, and 
willows that bordered the interlacing divisions of 
the Rhine that flowed through our city. Some 
of the one hundred and forty-five bridges that 
crossed the numerous water-courses could be seen. 
The city had been most beautiful. Alas, what 
blight had fallen upon it ! Starvation was in our 
streets, in the elegant houses — in the spacious 
squares. 

Many a time did I sit in the tower of Hengist, 
straining my eyes looking out over the wide, level 
country, hoping, praying, longing to see the glit- 
tering line that would tell me the ocean was com- 
ing. When would it come ? Should we be alive 
then ? 

One morning Caspar and Bliezer and I, with 
two other friends, known by us to be Anabaptists, 
climbed the artificial elevation on which, in Ley- 
den’s center, the ruined tower of Hengist stood. 
Gaunt skeletons that we were, we climbed still 


304 


IN kditha’s days 


higher, gasping with the weakness of starvation, 
till we reached the mouldering battlements of the 
tower itself. We looked abroad, but the land was 
dry. From sheer weakness we did not descend, 
but remained on our lofty lookout. 

All day our despairing watch was shared now 
and again by others, eager-eyed men and women, 
with emaciated, heroic faces. But the sea came 
not. Yet only a few days before the Estates had 
sent word to us : “ Rather will we see our whole 
land and all our possessions perish in the waves, 
than forsake thee, Reyden. We know full well, 
moreover, that with Eeyden all Holland must 
perish also.’’ 

The day wore by, and still we strained our eyes 
to see. The other persons who had climbed the 
tower had gone away, and at sunset there re- 
mained on the battlements only our little com- 
pany of five Anabaptists. 

• The sun went down. 

“Does the sea come?” cried a company of 
Dutch, stopping an instant beneath the tower. 

“No,” we answered. 

As long as possible, with eyes that grew^ dim 
and blurred through the watching, we waited. 
The sunlight faded. No change came on the 
horizon’s rim. The redoubts of the enemy faded. 

Afar in some street below, I heard a wild voice 
singing that song of the people. 


CHAPTER XX 


LEYDEN IS SAVED 

T SHIVERED as I listened to that voice. 

A ^2 " swaert is getrokken ! ” muttered Elie- 

zer fiercely, at my side. 

“My son! my son!” cautioned Caspar, ‘‘the 
sword of vengeance is not ours, but the Lord’s ! 
May he forgive our enemies ! ” 

And falling on his knees, Caspar prayed 
silently. 

Eliezer stood a moment. I knew the struggle 
that went on within his heart. It was hard to 
say, “ Father, forgive them ! ” when the Spanish 
troops hemmed us around and thirsted for our 
blood. It was hard to pray and wait — yes, it was 
hard to wait for Cod ! To wait and starve ! 

But my boy dropped on his knees beside his 
father. Our little Anabaptist group was very 
still. Those of us who were not praying were 
scanning yet with prayerful eyes the little of the 
country visible. 

Faintly the words of the singer came up from 
some far distance of the streets. Eliezer shud- 
dered, and the fingers that covered his face inter- 
locked more closely. 

The words of the Duke of Alva’s circular, 
u 305 


IN editha’s days 


306 

published in all the cities of the Netherlands, after 
the fall of Haarlem, mocked me with remem- 
brance and would not leave me this night. The 
pretended affection spoken of in the circular, its 
lying promise, the blasphemous assumption that 
Philip’s will and God’s were identical, all came 
back to me with bitter force. 

“Ye are well aware,” the circular ran, “that 
the King has, over and over again, manifested his 
willingness to receive his children, in however 
forlorn a condition the prodigals might return. 
His Majesty assures you once more that your sins, 
however black they may have been, shall be for- 
given and forgotten in the plenitude of the royal 
kindness, if you repent and return in season to his 
Majesty’s embrace. Notwithstanding your mani- 
fold crimes, his Majesty still seeks, like a hen call- 
ing her chickens^ to gather you all under the 
parental wing. The King hereby warns you 
once more, therefore, to place yourselves in his 
royal hands, and not to wait for his rage., cruelty., 
and fury., and the approach of his army. 

“But if,” went on the circular, “ye disregard 
these offers of mercy, receiving them with closed 
ears, as heretofore, then we warn you that there 
is no rigor, nor cruelty, however great, which you 
are not to expect by laying waste, starvation and 
the sword, in such manner that nowhere shall 
remain a relic of that which at present exists., but 
his Majesty will strip bare and utterly depopulate 
the land., and cause it to be inhabited again by 


LEYDEN IS SAVED 


307 


strangers ; since otherwise his Majesty could not 
believe that the will of God and of his Majesty 
had been accomplished.” 

Was God’s will then King Philip’s? Should 
we all be exterminated ? 

The light faded entirely from the sky. Had 
God forgotten us ? Did he, then, not care 
whether his creatures had religious liberty or 
not? We could never have it under Spain’s 
rule ! Would he leave us in the hand of Spain ? 

I remembered the prayers I had heard Anabap- 
tists pray for the coming of religious freedom. I 
remembered the multitudes of Anabaptist martyrs 
of this land. So many more Anabaptists had been 
killed than men of other beliefs. I remembered 
Gaspar’s saying that religious freedom would rise 
from Anabaptist graves. I recalled the face of 
the Rebaptizer strangled in the prison long ago, 
his eyes appealing upward to the God of freedom. 
I remembered the pitiful sacrifices that Anabap- 
tists had made to help, from their scanty means, 
the cause of William the Silent. And now the 
fate of religious liberty for Holland hung on this 
one city of Key den. Would God let the Spanish 
king conquer ? 

The darkness fell upon our little Anabaptist 
group when we went under the oaks that over- 
grew the center of the ruined old tower of Hen- 
gist. We had not spoken much together since we 
had answered the call of those who passed the foot 
of the tower. 


3o8 in editha’s days 

But now a low sobbing broke tlie silence of the 
dark. 

“ Oh, God of religious liberty ! ” the low, ago- 
nized voice sobbed reverently. “Oh, God of 
liberty ! ” 

There was no word of petition save that. The 
voice itself was a prayer. 

There were other hushed sobs among our weak 
and starving little company. And then, when 
silence came, a voice began to pray. 

“ Oh, God of freedom ! ” prayed Gaspar, taking 
up the thought that the other voice had sobbed ; 
“ God of soul-liberty, thou seest our starving city ! 
O Ivord, we implore thee, may the prayers of thy 
Anabaptist martyrs be answered ! Thine unnum- 
bered Anabaptist martyrs, O Tord, who have suf- 
fered fire, and pit, and stake, and horrors unutter- 
able! O Lord God of soul-liberty, Spain and 
the pope are thine enemies 1 Save Leyden ! O 
God, save Leyden 1 For if Leyden falls, 
whence shall religious liberty ever come for this, 
our native land ? O Lord God, thou knowest 1 ” 

And, falling prone on his face, my husband wept 
with all our company. 

It was on the first of September, as we discovered 
afterward, that Admiral Boisot came to Holland 
from Zealand, with eight hundred savage Zea- 
landers in his vessels. We did not know that two 
hundred vessels, manned with twenty-five hun- 
dred veterans, had assembled, and were coming to 
our relief. All we knew was that the ocean did 


LEYDEN IS SAVED 


309 

not come, and we were starving ! starving ! And, 
if we had known what force was coining, we 
might also have known that the Spanish King’s 
force was four times as great as that of those who 
wished to help us. And, between our friends and 
us were several dykes, besides villages; and the 
chain of sixty-two forts, as well as those villages, 
was held by King Philip’s veteran troops. How 
little prospect there was that help could reach us ! 
Yet we prayed. 

And now I must tell you what we heard after- 
ward, for being shut in the city, we could not by 
any manner of means know what our rescuers 
knew. I have told you that, before this, we had 
received word that the outer dykes were pierced, 
and that the water was rising upon the strong 
dyke, the “ Kand-scheiding, ” within five miles of 
Keyden. But the water did not rise above this 
dyke. The fleet of our rescuers could not there- 
fore pass it, the lyand-scheiding being still a foot 
and a half above water. 

But the Prince of Orange had given orders that 
the Tand-scheiding should be taken possession of. 
There were but a few Spaniards stationed on the 
dyke, and on the night of the loth and nth of 
September, the prince’s orders were obeyed, and 
the Kand-scheiding was taken without the loss of 
a man of William’s forces. 

But when day came the Spaniards saw what a 
mistake they had made in leaving the Tand- 
scheiding so poorly guarded, and rushing from 


310 IN EDITH A’S days 

two villages near the dyke, King Philip’s forces 
charged William’s. There was a hot battle, but 
the Spaniards were defeated. Hundreds of them 
were killed, and under the very eyes of the enemy 
our rescuers cut the dyke in several places. The 
fleet sailed through. 

But now there was a surprise. Prince William 
had been told by those who said they knew the 
country, that if the Kand-scheiding once were 
passed, the water would flood the country as far 
as key den. But this was not so. Three-quarters 
of a mile further inland was another long dyke 
called the “Green- way,” and this stood a foot 
above the water. 

The Spanish, however, had providentially been 
careless about this dyke also, and Admiral Boisot 
took the barrier promptly, leveled it in many 
places, and brought his vessels over it. Now he 
had expected to have immediately floated into a 
large mere, called the Fresh-water Take, but he 
found that he could reach it by only one deep 
canal. And now the sea failed him, for its waters 
had spread out over so wide a surface that no 
place, save the canal, was deep enough for his 
ships. And if he took the canal, that led to a 
bridge, where were many of the enemy. 

He tried to force a passage, but was defeated. 
And now, in the shallow water, the flotilla was 
obliged to stay, unable to help us. The wind was 
easterly, and this made the sea rather sink than 
rise. In keyden we were anxious over that same 


I.EYDBN IS SAVED 


311 

easterly wind. Hvery morning we looked at the 
vanes of the steeples. We climbed the towers 
and housetops, and looked and longed for the 
ocean, and yet we knew it could not appear unless 
the wind changed. 

Oh, how often, as we watched the vanes to see 
if any change came, or as from the tower of Hen- 
gist I felt the easterly wind blow, I longed and 
prayed that the wind might shift ; and I remem- 
bered the words of the psalmist : “ He bringeth the 
wind out of his treasuries. . . He causeth his 
wind to blow, and the waters flow.” If some 
“stormy wind, fulfilling his word,” might but 
sweep from some other direction than that whence 
the wind now came ! 

For we were in dreadful straits for food. We 
had lived on animals we should once have shud- 
dered to have eaten. Still a few cows, kept for 
their milk, remained. Some of these were killed 
daily, and divided into so small portions that the 
famishing people could hardly live on the morsels. 
Even the hides of the cows, chopped and boiled, 
were eagerly eaten. The green leaves of the trees 
and every living herb were gathered, and yet peo- 
ple starved to death. Mothers dropped dead in 
the streets, holding in their arms lifeless babes. 
And, worse than all, the plague broke out in 
Leyden. Hope died in our hearts. 

On the eighteenth, we knew that the wind had 
changed. It blew a gale for three days. But we 
could not of course tell what this availed. We 


312 


IN editha’s days 


did not know that before the second day was over 
the fleet of our rescuers was again afloat. 

One evening we crept to the tower of Hengist. 
The last sight that I saw before climbing the 
tower was a woman sitting, holding her dead 
child in her lap. The woman’s head drooped for- 
ward, her eyes were shut. 

“ Touch her not,” whispered Gaspar, his gaunt 
hand drawing me back ; ‘ ‘ the plague is upon 
her.” 

Stepping aside to avoid contamination, we 
dragged ourselves upward to the battlements, and 
sank there. 

It grew dark rapidly. The wind swept over us. 

“Is it again an easterly wind ? ” I questioned 
myself. 

It did not matter. I had lost hope that our 
friends would reach us while we lived. All I had 
eaten that day was some green leaves. 

We did not talk to one another, but sat in the 
dark while the hours passed. I had closed my 
eyes. 

“ A light ! A light ! ” screamed Gaspar, weakly. 
“ A light ! ” 

Startled, I looked and saw what brought cries 
from rooftops and towers throughout the city. 

“It is the village of Zoetermeer,” called one 
voice in the dark. 

“It is Benthuyzen,” disputed another voice, 
thrilled with excitement. 

Both were right, as we discovered afterward. 


LEYDKN IS save:d 


313 

The Spanish had been stationed at each vil- 
lage, but some fugitives having shown our friends 
the way to a lower dyke, the Spaniards had 
been seized by a panic and had fled inwardly 
toward lyeyden, stopping at the village of North 
Aa. Our friends’ fleet allowed the few remaining 
villagers to have time enough to flee from Zoeter- 
meer and Benthuyzen, and then those villages, to- 
gether with the fortifications, were set on fire. It 
was this blaze that we saw at Teyden. 

“Our friends are coming!” we cried to one 
another through the darkness, not knowing to 
whom we spoke save that we all were people in 
mighty peril. “William the Silent has not for- 
gotten us.” 

After this we heard salvos of artillery, yet we 
could not tell the exact import of the sounds, and 
days passed but no fleet came. Alas 1 the wind 
had changed. It was easterly again. 

Hundreds of the people of Leyden died of the 
plague. Yea, thousands died, and morning by 
morning Gaspar and Bliezer and I looked at each 
other, marveling that we were yet alive. For now 
we heard of houses where the watchmen found 
whole families, fathers, mothers, children dead 
side by side. And now, again and again, came 
letters from Valdez, the leader of the Spaniards, 
asking us to surrender and making us fair prom- 
ises. But, though gradually, as the helpless days 
went by, we had given up hope of aid, we would 
not yield to our besiegers. We did not know that 


3^4 


IN editha’s days 


it was because Valdez feared that the ocean might 
yet liberate us, that he sent so many, missives. 

Yet there were some faint hearts in Leyden, 
and a company of them was seen by Gaspar one 
day near where the church of St. Pancras stood 
with its high two-turreted brick tower and its two 
ancient lime trees. The company gathered about 
the burgomaster, Adrian van der Werf, reproach- 
ing and threatening him. 

The tall, haggard burgomaster waved his hat 
for silence, and cried out : “ What would ye, my 
friends ? Why do ye murmur that we do not break 
our vows and surrender the city to the Spaniards ? 
A fate more horrible than the agony which she 
now endures would be ours. I tell you I have 
made an oath to hold the city, and may God give 
me strength to keep my oath.” 

And so did the burgomaster inspire the crowd 
with his courage that the people went away, fam- 
ishing still, but enthusiastic, and ready to defy 
the enemy. 

The twenty-eighth of September a dove flew 
into our city. Blessed little messenger ! It bore a 
letter from Admiral Boisot saying that in a very 
few days at the utmost help would come to us. 
The bells of Leyden rang for joy. 

But Gaspar looked so gaunt and feeble that I 
asked myself : “ Can he live a few days longer?” 

And when the morrow came the vanes still 
pointed to the east. The water would never rise 
with the wind from that direction. We knew it 


LKYDKN IS SAVED 


315 

only too well. But we did not know that Admiral 
Boisot had written to William the Silent saying 
that if there did not come the fall tide and 
a strong wind nothing more could be done. The 
expedition must be abandoned. 

It was time for the autumnal equinox. Gaspar, 
used to the sea from his boyhood, had thought of 
what the extraordinary tide might do if a change 
of wind came. 

‘ ‘ The God of freedom is the God of tempests 
also,” said he to me that night, and then he went 
away alone to the tower of Hengist. 

When midnight came and he had not returned, 
I sent Eliezer for his father. But though Gaspar 
returned with him, he could not sleep. The old 
sailor spirit was alive in him, and he told me of 
storms he had known in autumn equinoctial days. 
When he ceased talking I knew that he prayed. 
And indeed so did we all. 

The next night, the last night of September, 
we all were in the tower of Hengist praying. I 
am certain we were praying, though we said no 
word aloud for a long time. At last Gaspar spoke. 

“ My Editha,” he said, “my Editha.” 

There was a silence. 

“ What is it, Gaspar? ” I asked at last, for the 
silence began to make me afraid. 

He did not answer. 

“Gaspar!” I cried. 

I reached forward in the dark and laid my hand 
on his arm. 


3i6 


IN editha’s days 


“ Caspar ! ” I repeated. “ Caspar ! ” 

Eliezer had put his arm around his father. To- 
gether my boy and I helped Caspar from the 
tower to the humble little place in which we lived. 
But in all the way home my husband neither 
spoke nor gave any sign that he knew what we 
said to him. All that night and the next day he 
lay almost unconscious. 

When night came again a storm had arisen. 
It became a violent gale that blew from the north- 
west and then tumultuously from the southwest. 
The equinoctial tempest for which we had prayed 
had come. But I had hardly noticed what went 
on outdoors. The longed-for tempest was as 
nothing to me now with Caspar lying so. More- 
over I was growing too weak to reason much 
about the wind. 

The storm increased as the night went by. I 
was sitting by Caspar when I was a little startled 
on looking at him to see that his eyes were open. 
I hastily tried to give him some few morsels of 
meat that an Anabaptist woman had, in her great 
sympathy and by much sacrifice, obtained for 
me. I did not know from what animal the meat 
had come. I would not conjecture. Hunger had 
taught us of Eeyden to be chary of questions. 
For myself, I knew I was starving to death. 

But Caspar put aside the food, though I begged 
him to eat. 

“I cannot,’’ he answered feebly. “Has the 
storm come, Editha?” 


i.e:ydkn is saved 


3^7 


The wind roared its answer outside. 

“Yes,” I too replied. 

Caspar closed his eyes. As I watched him, the 
tears rolled from beneath his shut lids. 

‘ ‘ Leyden is safe, ” he whispered. ‘ ‘ Our prayers 
are answered. The God of tempests is the God 
of freedom also.” 

He spoke no more, and seemed to relapse into 
the state of unconsciousness from which the tem- 
pest perhaps had roused him. I watched beside 
him all the next day. Eliezer was desperately 
trying to find food for us. When night came, 
Caspar was still unconscious. 

In the depths of that night a mysterious and 
dreadful sound roared through the city. I was 
startled. Were the Spanish upon us ? 

There was an extreme blackness of this night, 
and as I trembled I thought indefinitely that the 
darkness might have helped the Spaniards make 
an assault on Leyden. I was still wondering 
what the crash had been, when Caspar’s eyes 
opened. He looked steadfastly at me. 

“My Editha,” he whispered faintly; “my 
Editha, I am going to the land of freedom.” 

His face was very pale. I tried to say some- 
thing. His face with the gaunt hollows in his 
emaciated cheeks swam before me. My head fell 
forward on his hand. My last conscious thought 
was that if the Spaniards had taken the city Cas- 
par and I would soon be together in the better 
country of which he spoke. But I knew not 


IN editha’s days 


318 

what had happened. Out on the southern coast 
of Holland the waters of the North Sea had piled 
themselves in great masses and had dashed furi- 
ously on the land, over the cut dykes, on over the 
country. The first night of the tempest the fleet 
of our rescuers had been lifted and sailed in the 
storm and darkness. There was a fierce naval 
battle by night, where the branches of drowned 
orchards and the chimney-stacks of submerged 
farmhouses stood above the waves. The Spanish 
vessels were sunk, and our rescuers’ fleet came on. 

Five hundred yards from our city was the fort 
of Zoeterwoude. In the early morning the Span- 
iards, seized with the general panic that I believe 
was sent of God upon them, they having both 
troops and artillery sufficient to have roughly met 
the light flotilla of our friends, poured out from 
the fortress and fled along a road that led toward 
the city of the Hague. 

But the flood constantly deepened, and hundreds 
of the Spanish troops sank beneath the water. 
The Zealanders, moreover, sprang from their ves- 
sels to the crumbling dyke and drove the Span- 
iards mercilessly into the sea. Plunging into the 
waves, the Zealanders attacked the Spanish with 
boat-hooks and daggers. No one ever knew how 
many Spaniards fell, but hundreds must have 
perished. Those Spaniards who escaped fled to 
the Hague. 

Then was the fort of Zoeterwoude set on fire, 
and our rescuers passed to the last fortress between 


LEYDEN IS SAVED 


319 


them and Leyden, the fort of Lammen, only two 
hundred and fifty yards from our city. But this 
fort was filled with the enemy’s soldiers and artil- 
lery, and all day Admiral Boisot stayed anchored, 
trying to think what to do. The fort was so very 
strong. It looked now, to our rescuers, as if the 
enterprise might all be a failure, although Leyden 
had almost been reached. 

Inside our city the people were growing wild 
with excitement. Help seemed so near. 

But the night came — the night of pitch black- 
ness in which I waited so anxiously before, passing 
into unconsciousness beside Caspar. And oh, 
how anxiously those night hours went by for 
other folk in Leyden ! Strange things happened 
that night of prayer and sleeplessness. In the 
dead of night, out from the fort of Lammen there 
seemed to come a long procession of lights that 
passed over the water. Then an awful sound 
crashed through the blackness. It was the mys- 
terious noise that had startled me as I sat beside 
my husband. I could not guess its meaning. 
The truth was that the whole of the wall of our 
city, between the Tower of Burgundy and the 
Cow gate, had fallen. ' 

“The Spaniards are upon us ! The Spaniards 
are upon us ! ” cried one to another. 

And truly, if the Spaniards had known their 
opportunity, they would have been upon us. But 
the falling of the town wall sent as much terror to 
their hearts as to ours. In the darkness, the Span- 


320 


IN editha’s days 


iards thought that the desperate citizens of I^ey- 
den were coming forth to battle. 

An overwhelming terror, sent upon the Span- 
iards from the Ivord of Hosts who had fought for 
us with his tempest and his tide, fell upon our 
foes. Surely, as the Ivord in olden time made the 
host of the Syrians affrighted at no human foe, 
but at the noise he caused them to hear, so that 
they fled dismayed, and the siege of famished Sa- 
maria ended, so did the Lord our God send panic 
among the Spaniards, and they fled in the night. 

When day came. Admiral Boisot, not knowing 
what had come to pass, prepared to give battle to 
the Spanish force in the fort of Lammen. But 
the fort was very still. What did this mean ? 
Were the Spaniards already in Leyden, killing 
the people there ? 

Suddenly a man was seen wading through the 
deep water from the fort toward the fleet. Upon 
the top of the fort a boy waved his cap. 

The Spanish, with whom the admiral had ex- 
pected to have a hard and perhaps unsuccessful 
battle, had fled. Valdez, the Spanish commander, 
had also fled from his headquarters at Leyderdorp, 
within a mile of the city of Leyden. At the very 
moment when the city wall fell, leaving ample 
way for our foes to enter Leyden, they trembled 
and ran away. 

And so triumphantly the fleet of our rescuers 
swept past the last fort and into Leyden. Our city 
was saved. 


LEYDEN IS SAVED 


321 


Every human being in Leyden, able to stand, 
rushed to greet the coining fleet. Bread ! Bread ! 
Bread ! It was thrown from every vessel. The 
crowd caught the blessed gift. Bread ! Bread ! 

And when the admiral stepped on shore, a 
solemn procession was formed ; the magistrates, 
the citizens, the burgher guards, the sailors, the 
women, the children, all poured into the church 
and sent up a prayer of thanksgiving to God. 
Thousands of voices raised a song of thanksgiving, 
but the hymn broke, and the great audience 
sobbed and wept. The people were saved. 

But Gaspar and I knew nothing of it all. Relief 
came almost too late for us both. Eliezer had 
found us both unconscious, and frantic with grief 
had hastily summoned two or three friends who 
did what they could. It was starvation that af- 
fected us, and not the plague, as Eliezer had feared. 

Within the next few hours, as I have said, the 
fleet entered Leyden, and food could be obtained. 

I can never forget my feelings the next day 
when I regained consciousness, and without open- 
ing my eyes, thought “ I am alive ! I am alive, 
and Gaspar is dead.” 

How could I live without him ? Yet I must 
live for Eliezer’s sake. 

“Take this,” a quiet voice commanded me. 

I feebly opened my eyes. A woman was trying 
to make me take a spoonful of something warm 
and nourishing. And there beyond her, sat Gas- 
par — gaunt, haggard, but alive, alive / 

V 


323 


IN editha’s days 


Bliezer was giving his father a little broth. 

I swallowed what the woman gave me. I shut 
my eyes and tried to think. We were alive. It 
was an overwhelming thought at first. 

“The Spaniards will kill us,” I said to myself. 

Then I began to wonder where the broth came 
from. 

“ She is better,” I heard the woman’s voice say. 

And then my dear boy, Bliezer, dropped on his 
knees beside me, and cried in my ear : “ Mother ! 
Mother ! You are going to live ! We all are ! 
Leyden is safe ! The Spaniards are all gone ! 
The ships have come ! ” 

Slowly I took into my mind what it was that 
he said. His voice had sounded dimly in my ears, 
as Caspar’s voice sounded years before when I was 
so nearly buried alive, and he cried to me as he 
strove to help me, “ Bditha, Bditha, live a little 
longer ! ” 

By afternoon, such was the strength that food 
put into me, I was quite conscious, though weak 
as I lay listening to the wind. It blew a tempest. 

Bliezer came in with an awestruck look on his 
thin face. 

“Mother,” he said, — and his tone was thrilled 
with a reverent fear, as if he had looked on the 
work of the Almighty, — “mother, the Lord is 
rolling back the waters to the ocean. The wind 
is northeast. Oh, mother, if this wind had come 
a day or two ago, the fleet could never have 
reached us to help us.” 


I^KYDEN IS SAVED 


323 


The wind did blow, as my son said. In a few 
days the land near I^eyden was bare again, and 
the people began to rebuild the cut dykes. Never 
did I feel more truly that the hand of the L^ord 
had wrought for us, the hand of that God who 
divided the Red Sea and the Jordan for his people. 

“Do you not remember,” Caspar reminded me, 
“what William, Prince of Orange, wrote after 
Haarlem was laid desolate by our enemies ? He 
said : ‘ Before I ever took up the cause of the op- 
pressed Christians in these provinces, I had entered 
into a close alliance with the King of kings. The 
God of armies will raise up armies for us to do 
battle with our enemies and his own. ’ Has not 
God done as the prince said ? The armies of the 
waves and the winds have fought for us.” 

Four years before this, when the sea rose on the 
whole Netherland coast from Flanders to Friesland, 
when dykes broke and when so many persons were 
drowned, the Spaniards had loudly cried that the 
vengeance of heaven had descended upon the abode 
of heretics. What would the Spaniards say now 
when the waves had been our friends ? 

I shuddered when I remembered that nine years 
ago Philip II. had suggested, and orders had been 
sent forth, that heretics should be executed at 
midnight in their dungeons by binding their 
heads between their knees, and then slowly suffo- 
cating the victims in tubs of water. Many of 
Philip’s soldiers lay drowned to-day. Had God 
sent his waters in vengeance upon them. 


CHAPTER XXI 


AFTER the siege 


COMPx\NY of US went forth from Eeyden to 



look at the broken dykes. We walked afar 
beside the heaps where people already worked, re- 
pairing the bulwarks. The ground was yet damp 
and we went farther than we meant, for it seemed 
wonderful to be able to go forth from our city 
where we had been shut so long. 

Together, a woman and I climbed a portion of 
the dyke yet whole. I reached the top first, and 
looking over, cried aloud. 

“What see you?” asked the woman who came 
after me. 

I pointed. 

Below us, where we could plainly view their 
faces, lay the bodies of several Spanish soldiers 
where they had fallen beneath the boathooks of 
the Zealanders. The woman with me shrieked 
aloud, as I had, and turning, we both fled back 
toward the ruined fort of Zoeterwoude. Yet, as I 
fled, I knew that I remembered one of those 
Spanish faces. I should always remember it. I 
had seen it in my dreams often as I lived again 
that dreadful hour of the past. 

It was the face of that Spanish soldier who, 



In Editha’s Days 


Walking on the Dyke. 


Page 324 




AFTER the siege 


325 


years before, tore my baby Hendrick from my 
arms and threw him into the canal. Those Span- 
ish lips that were mute now had laughed at my 
agony. That voice that nevermore would mock 
at his victims had sneered: “Anabaptists, I can 
baptize a child ! See me play the priest ! ’’ 

Once more I could hear my child’s last cry ; I 
could hear the splash, far out in the canal ; I could 
see that mother struggle to break through the 
soldiers ; I could see that father grapple with the 
men who held him. 

The woman running beside me, now grasped 
my hand and drew me up to the ruins of the fort 
of Zoeterwoude. 

“How pale you are,” she said. “Were you so 
frightened? I am glad they are dead, those 
Spanish.” 

And in a whisper, for she herself was trembling 
and could hardly have sung, she broke forth into 
that song of the people, so awful to me : 
“ ’ 7" swaert is getrokken. ” 

I rushed away from her. I could not bear to 
hear the words. I was glad she was not an Ana- 
baptist, for one of our faith — ^yes, one of any 
faith — should have forgiveness for one’s enemies. 
And yet — was I glad to have seen that Spanish 
soldier lying there ? 

Oh, that long hour that I walked those broken 
dykes, wrestling with my innermost soul ! Did I 
forgive this enemy of mine, this man who, even 
if he were dead, had done me the most cruel 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


326 

wrong of my life ? Was I glad — could a Chris- 
tian heart be glad to see one’s enemy lying torn 
and pierced with the boathook, face and clenched 
hands showing the agony in which he had died ? 

“It is the vengeance of the I^ord!” I shud- 
dered as I walked. “It is the vengeance of the 
I.ord!” 

I had thought that I had fought this heart- 
battle years before. I had struggled often to pray 
for this Spanish soldier, that his awful sin toward 
me and mine might be forgiven him. I had 
prayed. I had thought I had obtained grace of 
God to forgive even this man. But in that hour 
alone upon the broken dykes I fought the battle 
over again. The Spanish soldier’s face had 
brought back to me the fierce hatred that had 
often knocked at my soul’s door when I remem- 
bered how I had been robbed of my boy. 

“Lord,” I cried, lifting my hands toward the 
grayness of the heavens as I stood alone among the 
ruins of the dykes, “help me to forgive! Help 
me to forgive as I would be forgiven ! ’ ’ 

When peace came to me, I went back to the 
city ; nor did I ever tell my husband or my son 
of what I had seen. I would not rouse again in 
their hearts the battle that had raged in mine. 
But I write it here that I saw the dead Spanish 
soldier who had so cruelly used me and mine. 
When my son Eliezer reads this chronicle he will 
see what I have said of that of which I could 
never bring myself to speak either to him or to 


AFTER THE SIEGE 


327 


his father. For I can never now think of the 
Spanish soldier’s mocking, laughing face, but I 
also see that same face, white and marred and 
ghastly, an awful thing looking up from the spot 
where he had fallen when God summoned his 
soul to eternity. 

ket me speak of other matters. No one must 
think that because the Spanish army was defeated 
at keyden therefore King Philip relinquished his 
efforts and left the Netherlands at peace. Relig- 
ions and civil liberty did not come so easily. 

Some of our friends thought of going to Eng- 
land, where Queen Mary was long since dead and 
where Queen Elizabeth had enforced severe laws 
against the Catholics. But Gaspar and I mis- 
trusted the English queen, and we felt more than 
glad the next year that we had not at- 1575 
tempted once again to reach my native 
land. 

For there came a woman to the little town 
where Gaspar and Eliezer and I were living in a 
boat, and as she passed us she seemed so weary 
that I spoke to her, and she rested a little on our 
boat. And often thereafter, since she had found 
that we were Anabaptists, she would stop to speak 
a word on her way as she went to or from the 
little town. 

Once I ventured to ask her, since she always 
was sad of countenance, if she was in trouble. 

God knows the troubles of his Anabaptists,” 
she answered, bursting into tears. 


328 


IN EDITHA’S DAYS 


She told me her sad story. She had long been 
an Anabaptist, and had suffered much from the 
devastations of the Duke of Alva in Flanders. 
With a number of other Anabaptists, she had 
fled to Protestant England, thinking that there 
would be religious freedom in that country. But 
they discovered that the spirit of toleration was 
not in England. 

“It was last Easter time,” she told me, “that 
about thirty of us Anabaptists met for worship in 
an upper room near the Aldgate in Eondon. We 
held our meeting very quietly, but some of the 
neighbors discovered it, and a constable and two 
ofl5.cers came to us, and addressed us as devils. 
The constable had twenty-seven names taken 
down, and at last we were conducted to jail. Two 
escaped on the way. 

“The third day we were released, but after- 
ward we were summoned to appear before the 
court in St Paul’s, and commanded to recant. 
We were spoken to kindly at first, but afterward 
we were told that if we did not recant we should 
be banished or killed. 

“We were asked various questions, one being 
whether infants should not be baptized. We an- 
swered that we could not understand matters so, 
for we read nothing of it in the Scriptures. After 
answering these questions, we were told by the 
bishop that our misdeeds were very gross, and 
that we could not inherit the kingdom of God. 

“ When we were in prison, after this examina^- 


AFTER THE SIEGE 


329 


tion, five of our number were persuaded to abjure, 
taking oath henceforth to utterly abandon and 
forsake ‘ all and every Anabaptistical error. * 

‘ ‘ A few days afterwards, in the court room of 
St. Paul’s Church, the rest of us were all con- 
demned to death. We women were bound hand 
to hand, and taken with one of the brethren, 
the youngest, to Newgate prison. The other men 
were taken back to the bishop’s prison. 

“We women were kept in suspense five or six 
days, supposing every day that we would be burnt, 
for people came every day to threaten us, and tell 
us that we should be put to death if we did not 
abjure. One evening about ten o’clock, the bailiff 
came with a servant into the prison to take an 
inventory of all our property, telling us that we 
must prepare for death the next day. But when 
we all kept steadfast and did not show ourselves 
afraid, the bailiff told us the truth. He said that 
the queen would be gracious to us, and merely 
banish us from the country, and that the young 
man should be whipped behind a cart. 

“So, five or six days afterward, we fourteen 
women were taken from the prison to the ship 
that was to bear us away from England. The 
young brother was whipped behind a cart till he 
came to the place where we took ship. Some of 
us left our husbands, some our fathers, behind us 
in the hands of the persecutors, and I do not know 
even to this day, what was done with my poor 
husband,” 


330 


IN kditha’s days 


And liere the woman who spoke with me wept 
very bitterly. 

Nor did she know her husband’s lot, for much 
time ofter this. Alas, poor man ! When we did 
hear, the news was sad enough for his wife. There 
had been five of these Anabaptist men left behind. 
They were sentenced to death and taken to New- 
gate, where they were heavily ironed and put into 
a deep and dreadful den where, after eight days, 
the poor husband of the woman who told me of 
her own banishment died ‘ ‘ of wretchedness and a 
load of chains.” But his dying testimony filled 
the other Anabaptists with joy. 

A petition and a confession of the faith of the 
four remaining Anabaptists were presented to 
Queen Blizabeth, but she did not believe in 
religious freedom and would have no mercy. 
Bven when John Foxe, whom Queen Blizabeth 
used to call “my father Boxe,” wrote a letter 
pleading with the queen, she refused to change 
her mind. Those Anabaptists must die. 

Queen Blizabeth granted them a month yet of 
life, but two of the imprisoned Anabaptists were 
told, early in July, that they must die. The two 
men who suffered at this time were Jan Peters, 
who had hoped to be more safe in Bngland than 
in the Bow Countries, and Hendrick Terwoort, 
who had been married only about eight or ten 
weeks before he was put in prison. 

Jan Peters, whose first wife had, some years 
before, been burned for her religion at Ghent, in 


AFTER THE SIEGE 


331 


Flanders, had entreated to be allowed to leave 
England with his second wife and his children. 
But the bishop would not allow it. And so the 
22d of July, the two Anabaptists were tied to one 
stake at Smithfield. 

An English preacher stood by and cried out, 
“ These men believe not on God.” 

But Jan Peters said: “We believe in one God, 
one Heavenly Father almighty, and in Jesus Christ 
his Son.” 

And so, refusing to abjure their faith, although 
a last chance of doing so was offered to them 
while bound to the stake, the two Anabaptists 
bravely died. 

Could we dare go back to an England where 
such things were done to Anabaptists, and where 
the queen herself had commanded all holding 
“such heretical opinions as Anabaptists do hold,” 
to depart from her realm ? 

In the next year the Ghent Pacification was 1570 
brought about in the Eow Countries. By this 
the Inquisition was agreed' to be forever abolished. 
Our whole nation, Catholics and Reformers, agreed 
to unite to expel the foreign soldiers. Fifteen 
provinces were Catholic, but in them it was agreed 
that there was to be no prohibition of private 
Reformed worship. It was recognized as a fact 
that the “ new religion ” was to be the established 
creed of Holland and Zealand. This Pacification 
was the work of William the Silent, and was the 
agreement of the Catholics and the Protestants of 


332 


IN editha’s days 


the Netherlands, though not the agreement of 
Philip, the Spanish king, by any means. 

His soldiers, this very year, most dreadfully 
massacred the people of Antwerp. This was one 
of the most terrible things ever done in the Neth- 
erlands, and for many long years, as I well remem- 
ber, it was called, “ The Spanish Fury.’’ 

It will be seen that the Ghent Pacification 
meant peace and liberty for the Catholics and the 
Reformed, if the promises were kept. But what 
did it mean for us Anabaptists ? Were we to have 
freedom ? We who had believed in the idea and 
suffered most for it ? 

Don John of Austria came to the Low Countries 
in that year, and the Pacification of Ghent was 
rather weakened than otherwise. 

It seemed to be impossible for William of 
Orange to teach his nearest friends that toleration 
and religious freedom are good things. It was ap- 
parently impossible for even Christian people to 
believe that those who thought differently should 
not be treated with force to make them change 
their religious convictions. The Reformed thought 
William did very wrong not to persecute the Cath- 
olics. And how terrible a thing it was that Wil- 
liam would not exclude the Anabaptists of Hol- 
land from the rights of citizenship ! William’s 
intimate counselor. Saint Aldegonde, an accom- 
plished man, was in despair because the prince 
would not exclude the Anabaptists. 

“The affair of the Anabaptists,” wrote Saint 


AFTER the siege 


333 


Aldegonde, “has been renewed. The prince ob- 
jects to exclude them from citizenship. He 1577 
answered me sharply that their yea was 
equal to our oath, and that we should not press 
the matter, unless we were willing to confess that 
zt was just for the Papists to compel us to a divine 
service which was against our conscience.” 

It seems, strange to an Anabaptist that so intel- 
ligent and accomplished a Protestant as Saint Al- 
degonde could not see how true and forcible were 
William’s words. And yet Saint Aldegonde was 
vexed that he could not see the Anabaptists ex- 
cluded from citizenship. 

“ I don’t see how we can accomplish our wish 
in this matter,” wrote Saint Aldegonde. “The 
prince has uttered reproaches to me that our 
clergy are striving to obtain a mastery over con- 
sciences. He praised lately the saying of a monk 
who was not long ago here, that our pot had not 
gone to the fire so often as that of our antagonists, 
but that when the time came it would be black 
enough. In short, the prince fears that after a 
few centuries the clerical tyranny on both sides 
will stand in this respect on the same footing.” 

It truly seemed as if William the Silent were 
right. The Protestants — not the Anabaptists, but 
the Reformed — acted as if they indeed had a 
“ mastery over consciences ” of other people. 
Many were the Reformed who would have liked to 
suppress Catholicism by the same enginery that 
the Catholics had formerly used. We should have 


334 


IN editha’s days 


had a Protestant Inquisition in the Netherlands 
if some Reformers had had their way. No won- 
der William charged them not to press the matter 
of Anabaptist exclusion, unless willing to confess 
that it had been just for the Papists to tyrannize 
over men’s consciences. 

Such turning of the tables as that, of course, 
would not be agreed to by any of William’s 
friends, yet they thought it right to persecute us 
Anabaptists. It was wrong for the Catholics to 
persecute the Reformed, and yet, if the Reformed 
could in turn have persecuted the Catholics, many 
would have done it. It was wrong for the Cath- 
olics to persecute the Reformed, and yet if the 
Reformed could make the lives of Anabaptists 
miserable, many believed in doing it. It seemed 
strange that people but lately delivered themselves 
from persecution should be so ready to turn perse- 
cutors, and that in matters of conscience. 

Gaspar and Bliezer and I dwell now in Middel- 
burg, on the island of Walcheren, in Zealand. 
1579 Thither have we journeyed, thinking to be 
more safe. But we have found here that 
Anabaptists must expect persecution. The mag- 
istrates have not protected us, but Anabaptist 
shops have been shut, and we have not been 
allowed to earn our living, because of our religious 
belief. The Protestants are much of the same mind 
as Prince William’s counselor. Saint Aldegonde, 
who wrote impatiently of the prince’s tolerance 
toward us. 


AFTER THE SIEGE 


335 

But tidings of the woeful plight of the Ana- 
baptists of Middelburg went to Prince Wil- 1573 
Ham’s ears last year. a.d. 

And again did William of Orange come to our 
aid, reminding the magistrates of Middelburg 
that the Anabaptists were always perfectly willing 
to bear their part in all the common burdens ; 
that the word of the Anabaptists was as good as 
their bond ; and that, in regard to military ser- 
vice, though the principles of the Anabaptists for- 
bade them to bear arms, yet these people had 
always been ready to provide and pay for substi- 
tutes. 

“We declare to you therefore,” said William 
the Silent to the magistrates, “that you have no 
right to trouble yourselves with any man’s con- 
science, so long as nothing is done to cause private 
harm or public scandal. We therefore expressly 
ordain that you desist from molesting these Bap- 
tists, from offering hindrance to their handicraft 
and daily trade, by which they can earn bread for 
their wives and children, and that you permit 
them henceforth to open their shops and do their 
work, according to the custom of former days. 
Beware, therefore, of disobedience and of resist- 
ance to the ordinance which we now establish. ” 

Will the magistrates obey? If William the 
Silent should die, would there be any toleration 
for us Anabaptists? I think not. And yet we 
wait, and suffer, and hope, and pray that religious 
freedom may come to this land. And by word 


336 IN editha’s days 

and example we do strive to teach men religious 
toleration. 

And now, if any one should ask me, “ What 
have you Anabaptists done to bring to pass your 
vision of religious freedom for all men?” I would 
answer : “We have given of our hearts’ blood for 
freedom of conscience; we have given those 
dearest on earth to die by stake, by strangulation, 
by living burial, because neither we nor they 
would agree to have our consciences domineered 
over by priest or pope ; we have wept tears of 
blood and agony ; we have prayed to our God 
night and day ; we have given our scanty money 
to freedom’s cause. We have not fought for free- 
dom of conscience, many of us, because many of 
us have believed war to be wrong. Our Master said : 

‘ If my kingdom were of this world, then would 
my servants fight, . . but now is my kingdom 
not from hence.’ We have suffered and we have 
appealed to the God who has promised to hear his 
people’s cries. He will deliver. ” 

What have we done for religious freedom ? Ask 
those whom the priests of Rome have murdered. 
Ask the unnumbered Anabaptist dead. Oh, thou 
foul and bloody church of Rome, binding men’s 
souls in fetters of spiritual death, tremble, for our 
God has heard the poor Anabaptists who cried out 
in agony ! There will yet come a day when 
neither priest nor emperor shall be able to keep 
religious freedom from the people of the earth. 


CHAPTER XXII 


AFTER YEARS 

I PHIUP BEOUNT, am the English leas 
A y great-great-grandson of that Editha who 
wrote of the trials of the Anabaptists in her time. 
One day recently I took from an old desk in our 
house the treasured, faded, yellow pages of 
Editha’s chronicle, and showed them to my sweet- 
heart, Rose Spencer. 

For I thought, and rightly, that Rose being a 
Baptist, as I am also, and each of my forefathers 
has been, back to the days of Editha, would be 
pleased to read with me what my great-great- 
grandmother endured for the faith’s sake. And 
especially was Rose glad to read the pages now, 
for this year is a great year with us all as an Eng- 
lish religious people, inasmuch that this year, for 
the first time in the history of England, we are 
legally tolerated, and are allowed to bear the name 
of “Baptists.” 

I read the thin pages to Rose myself, and she 
listened to the tale, and when I had finished she 
looked at me, and the tears ran down her cheeks 
as she said : “ Philip, when I think how those 

old-time Baptists suffered and died, struggling to 
secure religious liberty, I feel unworthy to call 

w 337 


IN kditha’s days 


338 

myself a Baptist. For what have I ever suffered 
compared with such people ? It seems as if some 
of them ought to be alive this year to hail our 
victory, and to rejoice to be called Baptists, and 
be glad to see religious liberty in England. I can 
rejoice, and I do, but what is my rejoicing com- 
pared with the joy that some of those old martyrs 
would have had to see this day ? ” 

But I answered my Rose : “ Peace, sweetheart. 
Perhaps they also rejoice in heaven. And I be- 
lieve that if you had lived in the days of old 
there would have been no braver Anabaptist than 
Rose Spencer.” 

And then we fell to talking with a kind of 
rightful pride of how much the Baptists have 
done in the past toward obtaining religious free- 
dom, not only for themselves but for others. I 
told Rose some things that I think she did not 
know before, for I said to her that if it had not 
been for the help that the poor, almost starving 
Anabaptists gave to William, Prince of Orange, 
when he struggled to free the Low Countries from 
the power of Spain, I knew not whether William 
would have succeeded or not. And woe to the 
Low Countries if he had not succeeded ! Woe to 
them if Roman Catholic Spain still held her 
grasp upon them ! What would have become of 
the Low Countries, and of the mighty influence 
that they have exerted for human freedom 
throughout the world, if William had not been 
successful ? 


AFTER YEARS 


339 


“And yet,” I told Rose, “who can tell how 
much of his success was due to the Baptists ? For 
at a time when William’s affairs were at the worst ; 
when his friends had failed him ; when his money 
was gone, and he was almost in despair, he 
appealed to the Baptists, and they came to his 
help. Once on the outskirts of Holland there 
was a refugee congregation, from which a poor 
Anabaptist preacher collected a small sum of 
money, and at the risk of his life brought the money 
to the camp of Prince William. The Anabaptist 
preacher told William that the money came from 
the people, whose will was better than the gift, 
and who never would want to be repaid, except 
by kindness when reform should triumph in the 
Tow Countries. And the prince signed a receipt 
for that money, and said that he was much 
touched by such sympathy. Other contributions 
of money came from starving and persecuted 
, church communities, and such poor exiles gave 
in proportion far more toward establishing civil 
and religious liberty than the wealthy merchants 
and nobles gave.” 

“ And Prince William did not forget it after he 
became a conqueror,” added Rose, still fingering 
the pages of my great-great>grandmother’s tale. 

“ No, he did not,” I returned. “ Prince William 
was not the man to forget. In 1577, as grand- 
mother Bditha says, when the Reformed asked 
that the Baptists should not be allowed to be 
citizens, because they were Baptists, William 


340 


IN editha’s days 


answered the unjust request indignantly, and said 
that the ‘ yea ’ of the Baptists was equal to the 
oath of the Reformed.” 

Rose smiled. 

“ I am glad,” she answered me. “It is some- 
thing that a conqueror like William the Silent 
should appreciate the Baptists and give such tes- 
timony concerning them.” 

“ And the next year he rebuked the magistrates 
of Middelburg for persecuting the Baptists, and 
William praised the Baptists for being so peacea- 
ble,” I added. “ But oh, if any people contributed 
to the coming of religious freedom in the L/OW 
Countries it was the Baptists ! For in the long 
lists of the martyrs there for half a century, ten 
times as many Baptists suffered as Reformed 
persons.” 

“ But,” Rose questioned me, her sweet lips quiv- 
ering, “ did the Baptists do any more for the Fow 
Countries than for England ? Think, think how 
our brethren have struggled here for religious lib- 
erty ! Think how many have died ! ’ ’ 

Tears filled her eyes, and I knew that she re- 
membered the day three years before this, October 
23, 1685, when she had stood at Tyburn, near 
London, and had seen her mother’s cousin, a poor 
Anabaptist woman named Elizabeth Gaunt, burnt 
to death. The woman was a very good, kind 
person, who spent a great part of her time visiting 
the jails and looking after the poor, and when she 
was burnt to death she so behaved herself that all 


AFTER YEARS 


341 


the spectators wept. And my Rose could never 
afterward speak of Klizabeth Gaunt without tears. 
For it was through the basest ingi'atitude and 
treachery that Elizabeth Gaunt, the Anabaptist, 
suffered death. But her judge was the infamous 
Jeffreys, and what else could be expected of that 
bloody man ? And to Rose, the one burning she 
had witnessed was but an index of the cruelty 
with which the Baptists of past years in England 
had been treated. No wonder she wished they 
might have lived till now to see the day of reli- 
gious freedom for which they struggled. 

“ Think of the days when the Baptists of Bick- 
enhall used to meet in the woods and other places 
of hiding, ” went on Rose. “Have the English 
Baptists no history of which we may be proud ? 
When Cromwell rose against that persecuting 
tyrant, Charles I., and became Eord Protector 
of the Commonwealth, did not the Baptists help 
in that struggle ? The Baptists were not found 
cowards then, even if Oliver Cromwell, after he 
came to power, did discharge all the principal 
officers in his army because, among other reasons, 
they were Anabaptists. A grateful thing that 
was for Oliver Cromwell to do ! ” 

I smiled, for a Baptist in this year of our re- 
joicing can afford to smile at past ills. But Rose 
was too much in earnest to smile. 

“ My father has told me of the pamphlet that a 
well-wisher to the Anabaptists wrote at that time 
to Oliver Cromwell, putting some questions to his 


343 


IN editha’s days 


conscience, ’ ’ continued she. “ And it would seem 
there were so many Anabaptists then, for the 
pamphlet asked if they had not filled Cromwell’s 
towns and cities and castles and navies and armies? 
I wonder if Cromwell, when he was a lad, ever 
heard of that treatise that Mr. Helwise and his Ana- 
baptist church of lyondon published, in which it 
was written that every man hath a right to judge 
for himself in matters of religion, and that to per- 
secute any one on that account is illegal and anti- 
Christian? ” 

“Cromwell was but a lad in college then,” I 
answered. ‘ ‘ Perhaps he did not so much care 
what Mr. Helwise and his church believed. But 
Cromwell may well have heard of the book called 
‘The Bloody Tenet,’ and the other called ‘The 
Compassionate Samaritan,’ that said that persecu- 
tion in cases of conscience was guilty of all the 
blood of the souls crying for vengeance under the 
altar. That was the time, you know, when Dr. 
Featly wanted that the Baptists should be utterly 
extermmated and banished out of England ! And 
this was because the Baptists believed in religious 
liberty ! Almost no other people in England be- 
sides the Baptists believed in liberty of conscience 
then.” 

As Rose turned over the pages of the old writing 
that lay in her lap, I bethought me of what other 
petitions Baptists had written, and of one address 
in particular, that speaking against using force, 
said: “Why, therefore, the Christian religion 


AFTER YEARS 


343 


should be built and supported by violence, when 
the foundation was laid and the work carried on 
during all the apostles’ days and some hundred 
years after by a quite contrary means, is a question 
would be resolved by those whose strongest argu- 
ments for the support of their religion is. Take him^ 
jailer. ’ ’ 

Verily, the old Baptists waxed sarcastic ! But 
Rose spoke. 

“ The old Baptist Confession of Faith, published 
forty years ago, shows how ready the Baptists were 
then to do to every man as the Baptists themselves 
would wish to be done by,” she reminded me. 
“ We were ready to grant religious freedom to 
every one. I believe that Baptists always have 
been ready to do that.” 

‘ ‘ Baptists were ‘ no way dangerous or trouble- 
some to human society,’ ” laughed I, remembering 
the statement of the confession ; “ they were ready 
to give to the needy, ‘both friend and enemy.’ ” 
We remembered various things that the Baptists 
had published. 

“ There was a translation from a Dutch piece 
printed seventy years ago in England, in i6i8,” 
Rose continued. “It was a treatise concerning 
baptism.” 

“And much I would give to see that same old 
treatise now,” I answered. “People say it was 
the first that was published in English against the 
baptism of infants.” 

“No wonder the Baptists wanted to publish 


344 


IN EDITHA’S days 


something^'' rejoined Rose ; “it was only two 
years afterward that they presented their suppli- 
cation to King James, telling of their miseries. 
Their goods had been seized, and Baptists then 
were spoken against from the pulpits, and men 
were kept in prison so long that many of them 
died, leaving widows and children.” 

“I remember,”' I added, “that at one time it 
was proposed that the Baptists be treated in Eng- 
land in some such severe way as they were by the 
senate of Zurich. That condemned Anabaptists 
to death, you know, and some were tied back to 
back and thrown into the sea. England has done 
as evil things as that to Baptists.” 

“England classed Baptists with the Papists, 
once, in treatment,” averred Rose, a stern look 
coming into her eyes. “ A Baptist to be counted 
as a Romanist ! And there was no toleration for 
either of us.” 

“ Be not wroth, dear heart,” I admonished her, 
smiling, though I remembered Baptist wrongs 
that brought indignation to my own soul, and 
te^rs to my eyes. “Remember that there were 
Christians, even among those persons who mis- 
understood and ill-treated the Baptists ! Remem- 
ber that even Dr. Featley, who wrote of the 
Baptists, and was hardly able to dip his pen in 
anything but gall when he wrote, yet when he had 
read the Confession of Faith published by forty- 
seven -Baptist congregations in the country and 
the seven congregations of Eondon, acknowledged 


AFTER YEARS 


345 


that they were neither heretics not schismatics, but 
tender-hearted Christians, upon whom, through 
false suggestions, the hand of authority had fallen 
heavily.” 

“ But he might have been more tolerant,” sug- 
gested Rose. “ The Baptists are, and have ever 
been, willing to tolerate those of other beliefs.” 

“Yes,” I agreed, “and we have written out 
plainly our arguments about baptism that other 
men might calmly read and study the matter. 
Even if we had been powerful enough I do not 
think we would have tried with the sword to force 
our religious belief on any one.” 

“It is contrary to the spirit of Christianity to 
do that,” stated Rose. “The Baptists urged years 
ago in their appeal to the king and Parliament that 
liberty ‘ ought to be given to all such as disturb 
not the civil peace, though of different persuasions 
in religious matters.’ ” 

“And I believe,” I answered, “that the Bap- 
tists, through their appeals for religious liberty for 
all men, have done grander work than yet is sup- 
posed. If the day of full freedom ever comes to 
all on earth, I believe that the Baptists will be the 
ones to bring it, under God’s providence.” 

Rose looked thoughtful. 

“ It has cost much for some to be Baptists,” she 
declared. “ I remember hearing of a minister 
who denied the baptism of infants, and he was 
kept eleven months in prison.” 

“Ah,” I replied, “remember that other poor 


IN KDITHA’S days 


346 

Baptist in Gloucestershire, the minister at Ren- 
come, who with his wife and family was penned 
into an upper room of his house, and was so har- 
assed night and day with the violence of the 
assailants and the noise of the hautboys that he 
died in the place.” 

“ In Gloucestershire ! ” exclaimed Rose. “ Yes, 
it was there that the Baptists felt suffering. My 
father has told me how the cavaliers would ride 
about with swords and pistols, ransacking the 
houses of the Baptists and abusing their families.” 

“But think of Lincolnshire,” I reminded her. 
“When the Baptists there made their petition to 
King Charles II., it was signed by thirty-five 
Baptists in behalf of many others in Lincolnshire. 
It was said in the petition that not only were their 
meetings for religious worship interrupted, but 
the Baptists were abused in the streets, and were 
not at peace even in their own houses. For if 
the Baptists were heard praying to God in their 
families, their enemies would sound horns and 
beat against the doors, and make threats of hang- 
ing. And many of the Baptists were indicted at 
the sessions for not attending on the preaching of 
the Episcopal clergy.” 

“And think a little before that,” rejoined Rose, 
“how the Baptists baptized men and women 
during the twilight in rivulets and in some arms 
of the Thames, and how the Baptist doctrine 
spread through England.” 

There was a little pause. 


AFTER YEARS 


347 


“ Hven our enemies have had to acknowledge 
the Baptists to be good people,” added Rose. 

“ Yes,” I answered, absently, for I was thinking 
of Henry Denne, him who was ordained by the 
bishop of St. David’s, and who held the living of 
Pyrton, in Hertfordshire, for ten years. He was 
arrested in Cambridgeshire by the committee of 
that county, in 1644, and was sent to jail for 
preaching against infant baptism, and for bap- 
tizing those who had received no other than infant 
baptism. After being in jail some time, he was 
sent up to London, his case, through the inter- 
cession of some friends, having been referred to a 
committee of Parliament. He was released after 
hearing, but two years afterward was arrested 
again in Lincolnshire, being taken on Sunday, 
and kept to prevent his preaching. He was 
charged with having baptized, but there was only 
one witness against him, and the minister refused 
to be his own accuser. The baptizing had been 
done at night, showing how severe the persecution 
of Baptists was at that time. I recalled the name 
of another minister, a Mr. Coppe, who was sent 
to Coventry jail about the same time for “re- 
baptizing.” 

And yet this was far from being the worst that 
Baptists had suffered, whether in England or else- 
where. How they had striven for the civil and 
religious liberty of the countries dwelt in ! What 
had not Baptists done for religious liberty in Eng- 
land? What had they not done in other countries ? 


IN EDITH A’S days 


348 

I looked at Rose and thought how many faces, 
fair once almost as hers, had vanished into 
Baptist martyr graves ; how many hands, dear 
perhaps as those that now softly touched the 
pages of my great-great-grandmother’s writing, 
had shriveled in the fires lit fo burn Baptists ; 
how many precious heads, beloved as the golden 
one beside me, had sunk beneath the water, 
drowned by the enemies of Baptists. 

Rose looked up with a little shiver. 

“I bethink me,” she said, with a smile, “how 
terrified I was once at the tale my grandmother 
told me when I was a child. It was of that Bap- 
tist, Robert Shalder, who suffered much in impris- 
onment, and who afterward died and was buried 
among his ancestors in Croft, of Ivincolnshire. 
The deluded people there hated the Baptists so, 
that on the very day when he was buried, the 
grave was opened, Robert Shalder’s body was 
taken out and dragged on a sledge back to his 
own gate and left there. I remember the horrified 
feeling I had as I thought how startling that dead 
Baptist must have been, lying stiff and cold in 
his grave clothes at his own gate ! And, Philip, 
that happened only twenty-two years ago.” 

While she was speaking, I remembered a tale 
that startled me also when a boy* It was con- 
cerning a Baptist minister, Mr. Benjamin Reach, 
and it happened about 1661 or 1664. 

“ He was conducting a service,” I told Rose, 
“ and troopers came, swearing : ‘We will kill the 


AFTER YEARS 


349 


preacher ! We will kill the preacher ! ’ They 
seized him in the midst of his service. ‘ We will 
trample him to death with our horses ! ’ cried four 
of the troopers. They bound the minister, laid 
him on the ground, and were going to spur all 
their four horses upon him to trample him to 
death ! But then their officer, seeing what was 
intended, rode up and kept the four men from 
doing their murderous deed. Yet the minister 
was tied behind one of the troopers, across a 
horse, and carried to jail, where he suffered great 
hardships for some time before he was released. 
I used to imagine the scene when I was a little 
lad, and think how the minister must have felt, 
lying there with the four horses ready to trample 
him to death. And I would imagine myself 
there, rushing in to hold back the horses.” 

Rose smiled. 

“ You would have taken the part of the Baptists 
even then,” she answered. “ One would know 
you were Bditha’s great-great-grandson.” 

Her finger rested on a page of Bditha’s writing, 
but her thoughts were elsewhere. 

“ I hope,” she went on, “ that the Baptists of 
the Colonies may never have to pass through what 
Bnglish Baptists have endured.” 

She flushed slightly as she spoke. We had 
often talked of a plan of ours, which was to go 
after our marriage across the sea to the Colonies 
of New Bngland, and there in the town called 
Providence, founded half a century ago by the 


350 


IN editha’s days 


banished Baptist, Roger Williams, find a home 
where we trusted leligious persecution would 
never come. 

“Ah,” I returned, eagerly, “how grand a 
country might not that new world become, if only 
the principle for which Baptists have striven so 
long might have free course there — the principle 
of religious liberty. God grant it may. If the 
Colonies become a country of religious freedom, 
I know right well that the hand of the Baptists 
will have brought it about. ’ ’ 

“Under God,” added Rose, reverently. 

“Under God,” I repeated, softly. 

“And may religious freedom come fully to 
England also,” wished Rose. “ To this England 
where Baptists have prayed, and fought, and suf- 
fered, and written, and plead for the religious free- 
dom of all. How much have Baptists had to do 
with bringing about such freedom as England 
now has. ’ ’ 

Rose looked at the pages of writing before her. 

“ See, Philip,” she said, as she pointed to the 
words, and I read them once again, those prophetic 
words of a hunted Anabaptist, hiding in a fagot 
pile : 

“ ‘ Editha,’ cried my father, his whispering 
eager with excitement, ‘ the Anabaptists have had 
a glorious history in the past. They will have a 
glorious history in the future. Oh, my child, 
shall not you and I be worthy of that history ? 
Shall we not do our part in the struggle for reli- 


AFTER YEARS 


351 


gious freedom ? It will come some day, Editha, 
this freedom we Anabaptists want for all men. 
Then no man will have to hide in a fagot pile 
because he reads the New Testament and believes 
that none but those who have repented and be- 
lieved should be baptized. Then every man shall 
be at liberty to worship God as he thinks right. 
Editha, I know the day of freedom will come, and 
I am proud to think what part the sacrifice of 
Anabaptist suffering and toil, yea the sacrifice of 
Anabaptist lives themselves, will have in bringing 
freedom to the world/” 

Rose turned to me and smiled tearfully. 

“The vision for which that Baptist gave his 
life is coming true,^’ she murmured. 

And I answered her ; “ The morning of the day 
of freedom has come. God has granted to the 
Baptists grace and wisdom to plead with men for 
general religious freedom ; to suffer banishment, 
and forfeiture of goods, and imprisonment for such 
freedom ; to strive, and agonize, and die for such 
freedom. May God be praised ! The prayers of 
the Baptists are being answered. The blood of 
their martyrs has not been spilled in vain. The 
day of general religious freedom is at hand. We 
see the glory of its dawn.” 


THE END 







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